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Posts Tagged ‘Outstanding Art Quilt’

Road 2018 Outstanding Artistry Quilt Winner

Saturday, March 17th, 2018

Lenore Crawford is featured frequently on our blog. Why? Because she has a knack for making award winning quilts.

In 2013, Lenore won Outstanding Art Quilt for Capturing Brittany. She won again in the same category in 2017 for Emma in the Looking Glass. Lenore’s latest winning quilt is Pinecones. It won for Outstanding Artistry at Road 2018. Lenore received a cash prize of $5,000 from Sponsor, Handi Quilter. Lenore’s award winning quilt journey began around 1995. She had just learned about watercolor quilting with 2” squares and wanted to make impressionistic art quilts with fabric using this technique. Lenore developed her own style using those squares. After about 10 years of doing that technique, she felt she needed a change and tried fusing. A large winter project that took months to complete, Pinecones was inspired by a trip to a nursery that Lenore took with her mom and sister who love conifers. It was in spring and the beauty of the brand new pinecones growing on the trees captured Lenore’s imagination. Lenore recalled, “They were bright colors against the dark greens of the branches.” What was Lenore doing when she found out she had won? She was watching TV at about 11:00 at night and was just getting ready to go to bed. She quickly looked at her email and was very surprised to see the one from Road. Lenore was so excited to find out that she won that she immediately texted her husband (who was in California; they live in Michigan) to tell him. Next, she posted it on Facebook. Her husband answered the Facebook post before her text!! What does Lenore plan to do with her prize money? “My husband and I are planning to retire at the end of this year. I am going to save it for a trip to either Ireland and Scotland or a riverboat cruise in France.” Congratulations Lenore Crawford for another outstanding winning quilt.]]>

Outstanding Art Quilt – Road 2017

Friday, April 14th, 2017

Emma in the Looking Glass was made and quilted by Lenore Crawford who won $5,000 from sponsor, Handi Quilter.Winning Quilt by Lenore Crawford

Lenore Crawford is no stranger to Road to California. She has been a member of the teaching faculty in the past and in 2014, she won in the same category, Outstanding Art Quilt, for her work, Capturing Brittany. Lenore started quilting in the late 1990’s using 2” fabric squares as her art medium in the watercolor quilting style.  She created impressionistic art quilts with the squares.  Up until that time, she hadn’t done any quilting; just lots of other things with different mediums. What inspired Lenore to create Emma in the Looking Glass? Lenore along with her friend, her friend’s daughter and granddaughter were visiting Lenore’s mother’s gardens where there is a beautiful lily pond that Lenore’s step-father had built.  Emma, the granddaughter, was playing around the pond when Lenore took her picture.  It was a beautiful sunny day in mid-summer and Lenore was “really inspired by the whole scene.” Lenore spent several months in the winter of 2016 creating Emma in the Looking Glass.  It was one of the very first quilts Lenore had done of a person using her fusing technique.  The most difficult part was finding the perfect flesh tone fabrics which in the shadows and water were very purple.  Lenore ended up using her fabric paints and painting the colors and values of fabrics that she needed for them. When Lenore found out she had won, she thought that it was “very exciting to win a prize like this!  I like to have my art quilts in large shows so others can see what can be done with fabric.  If I win a prize that is the icing on the cake!” She is planning to use her prize money toward the purchase of a new car where she can “enjoy it every day!” What does the future hold for Lenore? She has already finished a large piece this past winter that she plans to enter either in 2018 or 2019 at Road to California.  She loves to have a large piece in the works.  For Lenore, the larger the piece the more detail she can add to it which “makes it all the more fun!” We can’t wait to see what Lenore has created next!! To learn more about Lenore, please visit her website.  ]]>

So You Want To Make A Winning Quilt- Road 2016 Outstanding Art Quilt

Saturday, May 14th, 2016

Beach Sculptures was made and quilted by Judy Leslie. She won $5,000 from sponsor Handi Quilter, Inc. for winning Outstanding  Art Quilt at Road to California 2016.

[caption id="attachment_4043" align="aligncenter" width="602"]Photo credit: Judy Leslie Photo credit: Judy Leslie[/caption]

Judy Leslie is from Coquitlam, BC Canada. Her original design took about a year to complete. She uses a domestic machine for her quilting!!Judy Leslie

How did you get started in quilting?  I have always loved designing with fibre (this is the Canadian spelling of fibre!).  My interest began as a pre-teen by dreaming up and sewing ‘exotic’ doll clothes for my younger sister.  I then moved on to constructing a vast array of garments over the years.   About twenty years ago I discovered the wonderful tactile nature of cloth in ‘quilt’ form. I began by making a few traditional style quilts, but soon developed an interest in creating art quilts.  Once I retired from a teaching career, I was able to devote more time to experimenting with techniques and designs.  I am forever inspired by the lushness of our local landscape as well as recent journeys to other vistas.

What inspired your winning design?  My husband and I have spent many winter vacations leisurely exploring Kauai’s beaches.  The slowly eroding shoreline produces exquisite ‘beach sculptures’. The remains of trees, with their intertwined roots, are stripped of their bark and gradually reveal incredible tints of creams, pinks and grays.

How long did it take to make your winning quilt? What did you learn along the way?  I usually focus on making at least two pieces at a time as I ponder and plan future projects.  The complexity of each artwork’s construction means that a single piece may take many weeks or even months to complete.  Sometimes family responsibilities or travel takes me away for periods of time, yet often this time allows me to contemplate ways and means of enhancing the projects that I’m in the process of completing. [caption id="attachment_4044" align="aligncenter" width="508"]Photo Credit: Judy Lesllie Photo Credit: Judy Lesllie[/caption] What was your reaction when you found out you won Outstanding Art Quilt?  I was ecstatic!  I was awarded Best Painted Surface at the Road to California in 2013 and I thought that nothing could surpass that thrill.  When I received the news I was with my husband and friends on the Big Island of Hawaii wishing I could be at the show in California. Did you do anything special with your prize money? Other than purchasing a huge selection of threads that I have coveted for at least ten years, my prize money is in my Savings account!  My ‘workhorse’ domestic machine has never let me down for eight years;  I now have a contingency fund should my machine decide to be uncooperative in the future. Where do you go from here with your quilting? At the moment I am creating two major pieces.  Although I am using different materials and techniques, both pieces have an animal theme.   Making art quilts is an important part of my life and I receive immense pleasure from working in this medium of artistic expression. Since 2007, I have exhibited quilts in a number of major quilt shows and galleries in both Canada and the USA.    Many award winning pieces can be viewed on the Fibre Art Network website.  I have taught a variety of classes in the past.  Physical limitations now prevent me from this pleasure so I am contemplating self publishing a book on some of my favorite techniques.

Editor’s note: You can read a more detailed account of Judy’s work on Beach Sculptures in the Autumn 2015 edition of  The Canadian Quilter magazine CQA/ACC.

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