How many stitches?

August 11, 2021

I’m having trouble with my Bernina 740 machine. So I brought it into the spa to shower it with care. And, it came back with the same problems. It stops intermittently with no discernible reason. So I am a bit hobbled right now. Which makes me think of other ways to entertain myself. Today I spattered more ink across a piece of canvas and yesterday I spent most of the day working on an upcoming presentation for the Studio Art Quilt Associates (all SAQA members can register for the presentation here).

Ink spattered on canvas is a starting point for free-motion quilting designs. It won’t take long for this piece to inspire some stitching,

Fun with math

As the folks at the Bernina shop try to figure out what exactly might be causing this little problem they did give me some mind-boggling information. I bought this machine in 2016. That’s five years ago. It now has 2,395,196 stitches recorded on it. If I stitch on average four hours a day five days a week for 5 years excluding holidays and weekends that would mean that I put in about 1916 stitches in a day. And if there are ten stitches per inch then I would be stitching about 191 inches in a day. Or about 16 feet. Or about three times my height. That seems doable.

Changing my focus

Though I know that there are days when I stitch what feels like miles and miles of thread there are other days when I can’t stitch at all—like yesterday. Those are the days when ideas have a chance to breathe a bit. They can percolate or morph. I can attend to some bookkeeping or housekeeping. Those are the days when I can look around for other toys to play with. Those are the days when I spatter paint across a canvas.

At Play in the Garden of Stitch, thoughts that come while eyeing the needle.

About my book, At Play in the Garden of Stitch

I have had such positive feedback about the book I just released. Thank you. I am grateful for your thoughts and comments. For those not familiar with it you can order a copy at Barnes & Noble, your local bookstore, Amazon and at any number of online bookstores. It is a compilation of simple stitch exercises, stitch tips and quilt stories. Many of the samples in the book are from my students. If you do order the book I would really appreciate it if you could leave a review on the site on which you purchased it (a little shameless self promotion here). I hope the book inspires you to look for new ways to experiment with this medium.

An Interview with Ariane Zurcher

I had the wonderful opportunity to talk with the talented Ariane Zurcher about my work and art practice. Here is a link to the video that she posted. Take a look around at her other interviews while you are at it. She is a delight and provides many stitch-related videos on her site.

Invisible art quilt takes center stage

July 27, 2021

My art quilt, Invisible, is featured in a new video posted by the folks at the Dairy Barn. The directors at the Dairy Barn graciously asked the artists in the show to create short videos that would feature their quilt. There are many other artists who also created a video so pour yourself a cup of tea, sit back and be entertained. The links that follow will lead you there.

The Quilt National show is considered one of the premier art quilt shows worldwide. People from all over submit their work to the judges to be included. This year Nancy Bavor, the Director at San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles, and professional textile artists Brigitte Kopp and Karen Schulz, were tasked with sorting through 747 submitted artworks from 388 artists from six continents. 84 pieces were chosen. The show is in Athens, OH until September 6 then some of the pieces will travel for three years at venues across the continent. If this show comes near you, or if you are within shouting distance of Athens, OH, take the time to see it. If not, the digital exhibition is here. The works are seriously ground-breaking textile works of art.

Here is the video I made to familiarize people with my point of view and the way the piece was conceived. Spoiler alert: It’s on wheels. Check out other artists works in the show here. Enjoy!

Have you entered an art quilt show? Tell me about it.

I wrote a book

July 16, 2021

At Play in the Garden of Stitch—thoughts that come while eyeing the needle.

Published! Available Now.

I put it on paper. It’s now in book form. This is not a quilt.

I spent part of my Covid year writing, analyzing and illustrating my techniques and artwork. After fifteen years of creating and teaching, it was time to tell my story and share my process in a more formal way.

This is a book of ideas and exercises for those who use stitch in their artwork. What seems like magic are merely (some simple) step-by-step exercises that will lead you to your own creations.

This is the story of how I work and think as I make new quilts. It contains both successes and failures as both results can lead to finished quilts. One of my favorite exercises is to chop up a finished quilt to re-arrange and re-imagine a new piece working with elements I like and scrapping those I loathe.

As the great Miles Davis says: do not fear mistakes; there are none.
As I like to say: Art is found in the process. And stitching can take you there.

The book contains lavish illustrations of quilts from my students and myself. For many of these, I demonstrate approaches to using stitch as an element of design and art. To understand my process, I include essays from this journal that reveal how I follow the thread or pursue an idea.

Order “At Play” from any number of bookstores including Barnes and Noble, Target, Indiebound, Discover books and more—such as Amazon. And, if you do find that this book has inspired you to try some new ways to create in stitch, please let me know by leaving a review or sending me an email. I would really appreciate it.

If you are interested in stitch and how to express yourself through free-motion quilting, this book will lead you gently down your own creative path. The secret is starting simple and staying at it.

I want to send out a bucket of thanks to my friend, Kathleen Loomis, for her help in making this book a reality. Her patient review of the content clarified my thoughts and made it a better book. Thanks so much Kathleen.

Tell me what you think!

Puzzles

July 9, 2021

I love puzzles. It’s a treasure hunt with rewards. Something about that quiet contemplation of shape, color and texture soothes me.

I guess that’s why I am drawn to this art form. Piecing together disparate elements to create a whole is a challenge that never ends. This particular piece grew from scraps of quilts gone by — those pieces that didn’t quite make the cut in other quilts have a new life here. I stitched the scraps together using my free motion foot or a decorative stitch that added to the level of detail. As I was piecing together these scraps characters appeared, shapes repeated and textures multiplied. I used the base composition as a stage for other characters that I added in with overstitching.

Things we might not notice without closer inspection. 2021, Paula Kovarik

The following are detail shots that might give you an idea of what started to appear as I was working on the whole. I started to run out of scraps toward the end. Which gave me a choice: cut up another quilt or finish the composition. I decided to end the composition here so that I could focus on other ideas that are floating in my studio. I may come back to it if other scraps become available.

Let’s stitch together

I’ll be teaching stitch techniques in San Diego in September. Click on the image to learn more.

Let the fun begin

June 11, 2021

I’m getting ready to leave my studio for a week to attend a workshop on collage. There is so much to do before I leave that my attention wanders while I make lists, clean up the space and plan for my return. That part called “cleaning up my space” always leads to new ideas for work. So I abandoned all the chores I didn’t want to do while concentrating on what I did want to do.

I cut up another quilt.

This quilt hung in the hallway of our house for about 7 years. I finally took it down and substituted a different piece. It is called File Sharing and I think I made it back in 2010. I like the color palette, I like some of the stitching, but I’m not too fond of the composition. So it became a candidate for recycling.

I’ve been thinking about how pieces linger in the studio. Repurposing them gives them new life and me a new challenge. This time I wanted to cut this quilt up into a traditional pattern called Storm at Sea. I have been playing with that pattern in an illustration program and wanted to see what would happen if I used quilted pieces to create it in a different way.

I made a set of templates with a stiff matte board. After cutting out the template pieces I am left with windows that I can position over the quilt to preview what I will cut. I simply use a pencil to draw the outline on the quilt and then cut the piece with scissors.

I think there is a song with the lyrics “the first cut is the deepest…” I was humming that while cutting into the quilt. It is a point of no return for this process. No amount of stitching or glueing will bring this quilt back to its original form. You have to just trust the process.

Here is the result of that day’s work.

Putting the pieces together into a layout is like playing with puzzles—one of my favorite things to do.

I attached the pieces to a backing fabric with small pieces of Misty Fuse.

Then started stitching them together onto the cloth background with a decorative stitch.

That’s when my sewing machine started acting up. And then it finally froze. I think it was reminding me that I had a lot of chores to do. So I guess I will have to come back to this piece once I return from the workshop. I have ideas on how I will add even more stitching to this beginning.

Watch this space.

Have you cut up any of your quilts? Tell me about it.