Yesterday, I finished quilting my piece to submit for consideration in a juried invitational called “The Space Between,” which will be co-curated by Leslie Tucker Jenison and Jamie Fingal. I just pressed it (with lots of steam), and it is actually lying flat. Hallelujah! I am amazed, as I had worried that such heavy quilting would make it go very wonky, and it was certainly looking that way before I pressed it. I thought you might like to see the back of the piece, which more clearly shows the stitching, all done in black and white thread (Aurifil Cotton Mako 50).
The back looks like a pencil drawing, and it is quite a nice effect. When I was worrying about the wonkyness, I thought I might have to add a layer of interfacing and another backing, and quilt some areas again to take care of this. I am so glad that I didn’t have to, since it would have hidden all of this wonderful stitching.
Here is a shot of the front:
Now, on to the binding. I usually face my art quilts, but if I do this, I will turn under just a bit of the quilt, and at this point, it is slightly smaller than the size requirement for the exhibition, and a binding will add a bit back. And I think a small white binding will frame it nicely. I hope to show you the finished piece in my next post.
And I have a name: Hope is the Thing. It comes from a poem that was special to both my mother and me, and seems appropriate, as I was working on this piece when I learned about her death on Jan. 26. My mother loved two American poets very much: Robert Frost and Emily Dickinson, and passed that love on to me. The name for this quilt comes from this poem:
HOPE
by Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune – without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm
I’ve heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
Posts
