Reveal #6 Close Ups of The Next Two Quilts

“Livin in the USA”

Marie

For this challenge I tried to think of what was ‘down home’ American and my first thought was Blue Jeans.  So I decided to base my piece around a Levis Jean pocket.  To me the USA has always been about freedom.  I discharged with bleach to lighten the blue around the pocket then stitched FREEDOM in Navy Blue and added a couple of flags.  I found what I felt was a great patriotic fabric to use as the shirt above the jeans only to find that I had incorporated WAY too much blue in the piece.  I placed a fun  ‘peace’ hand symbol on the shirt. I added the red to the sides then again began discharging with bleach to further tone down the blue of both the shirt and jeans.  I am still amazed that I managed to not ‘hit’ the red with the bleach in the process! I then painted with white to further ‘lose’ the blue.  I added addition red and white stars with stamps, appliqués, and paint, then free-motion quilted additional stars throughout the piece. I used foil to add additional dimension.     

“Fenêtres sur l'Europe”

Annick

Guidelines: "Mother Country" in red and white, with a touch of blue.  Long ago, I had decided that the largest panel of my challenge was going to be the continent of Europe.  My husband, Robert, suggested I call the challenge "Mother Country" and I chose red since this is one of my favourite colours (and it had not yet been used for any of our previous challenges!).  "Mother Country" fitted perfectly well for Europe, since I am French and Swiss, and my husband is British.  A little bit of geography/history: The Council of Europe is composed of 47 Member States.  The European Union itself has 27 Member States, and its flag is blue with a circle of 12 golden stars.  I designed my challenge with the view of incorporating the 47 Member States, therefore 44 small windows and 1 larger one which incorporates the three which are close to my heart: France, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.  To symbolize the diversity of all Member States, I have used 45 different reds and 45 different whites.  I chose one uniform white background to signify the European Unity.  The larger window was made using a piece of fabric from my wedding dress and I used a paisley fabric as it reminds me of the UK.  Marianne is a French national symbol but not the official national symbol, which remains the French flag.  I therefore pencil coloured (just like on canvas) Marianne's profile (which has been used for stamps, coins, busts, etc.).  And, of course, I added the French, Swiss and British flags, as well as the European flag.

New technique: Attic Windows, and I had to work out the dimensions of all the windows, which was rather mathematically challenging (please do remember that I had to learn inches and feet - rather than centimeters and meters - when I started quilting).  And pencil colouring.