Posted on April 28 is the beginning part of my challenge.  As I left off, I had painted my tombstones and was ready to quilt them.  I will be using black thread to give the look of a sketched painting. I solved the challenge of drawing these lines by first creating a drawing from the enlarged photo onto tracing paper. I pinned the tracing paper on top of the quilt and quilted over the lines I had drawn. This worked great–except I did spend some time picking out the pieces of paper. I’m also sure this isn’t the best thing for your needle.

loaded on the frame, some lines quilted

Picking pieces of tracing paper off the quilt

Once I had all the lines quilted and all the tracing paper picked off, I emphasized the quilting lines. I did this my creating heavier lines of quilting in some areas.  The following are pictures showing the bricks partially highlighted, then one of the tombstones highlighted. You can really notice a difference in the tombstone with the heavier quilting line.

some bricks showing heavy quilting lines

quilting emphasized on one tombstone

I continued to rework the lines on the piece, creating a depth. However, when I finished, I felt it still needed something more. So I went back to the studio and repainted some areas.  I used Setacolor and Jaquard Textile paints. Repainting certain areas gave me the highlights and depth I was trying to obtain.

My piece is now finished, except for the mounting. I will mount it on stretcher strips at a later date. Here is the finished piece and a couple of closeups.

finished piece

closeup of the bricks

closeup of the bottom

I am working on my second piece for the 3 Creative Studios 2010 Quilt Challenge.  The word for the second challenge is “Passage.” When faced with the dictionary definition of passage, there are a lot more meanings for the word than I thought there were.

The first image that came to my mind was the passage of the river through our town. At the time the word was put out to the group, our town was flooding (there are pics on other posts about this). I found an aerial view of the flood forecast for our town and was going to use that as a basis for my project.

Then I thought twice–sometimes that can get you into trouble. I was thinking about the veins and arteries in our bodies and the passage of blood through them. I was thinking about the abstract lines that could be created by making a closeup of an arm or a leg.

Then after voicing my thoughts to Michael (my DH), he got me thinking on another track altogether. The passage of this life into another. I found a picture I had taken at a cemetery in Savanah, GA a few years ago that I liked. I was intrigued by this wall of very old, seemingly anonymous, tombstones.

Wall lined with old tombstones

closeup of the wall lined with old tombstones

The closeup picture is the one I decided to use for my Passage piece. I manipulated the picture in Photoshop to get the look I wanted. The next step is to transfer it to fabric. I decided to paint a piece of Kona cotton with Jaquard Textile Paints and Setacolor paints. I started with a light wash of color. After that dried, I painted a second layer with more intense colors. Next I will put it on my quilting machine and “draw” on it with black thread. It should get a very sketchy look.

1st wash of color

2nd layer of color

I can’t wait to see how the quilting will turn out. Stay tuned for part II.