Venus Must Be in My Creative House

Well the planets must be aligning or something because yesterday I cleaned my studio AND worked on the artichoke quilt. And when I say, "cleaned my studio" I mean both lower and upper surfaces. Who knew there was a floor. And good golly a desk top. So here's the sketch for the artichoke. I know it has way more petals (or whatever those things are called) than the average artichoke. But for me the sketch is about learning the shapes and scale, figuring out where things sit on the page, and experimenting with color and texture. So they go a little wild sometimes. It's colored pencil and Sharpie. I also make notes about construction, fabric and quilting. This is because otherwise I would forget what I was going to do and the thing would end up as a string bean or something.

Here are my supply items. The lighter green is a piece I hand dyed and the darker piece is commercial fabric. In the end, I went with the darker fabric because the texture was more artichoke like. I will paint it with Jacquard textile paint and some lumiere for the purple highlights.

After the sketch, I made a cartoon. This is what it will actually look like. You might not notice because I have a crappy camera, but the actual artichoke is smaller than I originally thought it would be. That's one of the things I learned from the sketch. I needed to bring the size and scale down to make it work. This is why you should just go for it in your sketches and art journals. I think you have a better sense of what will work if you just go a little crazy on paper first. After all it's just pen and wax and paper.

I used this the cartoon to make the pieces out of fusible web. I followed the advice in Robbi Joy Eklow's book, "Free Expressions". That's where the numbers and arrows come from. I was debating about whether I should paint the fabric and then cut out the pieces or cut out the pieces and then paint. I decided I would have more control of the painting if I assembled the artichoke first. So, I got the thing cut out and put together. Now I need to paint it. It is actually looking like an artichoke, so I'm pretty happy about that. I know. I can't believe I got so much done either.