Saturday, October 22, 2011 was a big day. We unveiled Power Suits: An Art Quilt Challenge at Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria, Virginia, to a bustling space filled with artists, family members, friends, and newcomers to the art quilt world.
About the Exhibit
Quilts will remain on exhibit at Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria, Virginia, through November 23, 2011. They are available for viewing during shop hours or by special appointment.
Viewers’ Choice
The Viewers’ Choice Made Me Think Award went to Ellie Flaherty for her quilt The Real Power Suits. The quilt featured three nuns made in the image of her mother, her grandmother, and her great-grandmother. I love the play on words: The Real Higher Power Suit.
The Viewers’ Choice Hands-Down Favorite Award went to, well, me! I created a quilt called Power Suited Him from a portrait of my father. This image of my father has been a favorite of mine and I loved using it for our Power Suit Challenge logo. I tried to develop a different idea for my challenge quilt, but I kept coming back to my father’s picture. I’ll try to blog a little about process later. In response to requests for a class in this technique, I will offer a Studio Tech class in photo-inspired art quilts at Artistic Artifacts in the coming year.
Exhibit Travel and the Power Suit CD
I’m thrilled to say that our quilts are scheduled to travel! We currently have two quilt shows on our calendar and we are looking for more opportunities to share these treasures with more quilters. If you are interested in showing our quilts, please contact me. We’d love to hear from you!
Look for Power Suit Quilts at these shows:
- March 14-17, 2012: Lancaster Spring Quilt Show at the Host Resort in Lancaster, PA
- January 24-27, 2013: Road to California in Ontario, California
We’ve created a Power Suit Quilts CD that includes the quilt images and artist’s statements. We’ve included two formats on the CD: a PowerPoint presentation that requires PowerPoint on your machine to view and a PDF that requires Adobe Acrobat Reader (a free download that comes loaded on most machines) to view. These will be available at Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria, Virginia, at the Artistic Artifacts booth at the IQA Festival in Houston, TX November 3-6, 2011, and on the Artistic Artifacts website after the second week in November.
Next Challenge
While we had a captive audience, Judy and I announced our next challenge: Arts & Old Lace!
Unlike the Power Suit Challenge, we’ve limited the number of packets we’re distributing. After the feeding frenzy at the debut, we continued to receive calls for the packets. We’re taking whatever we have left to the IQA Festival in Houston, where I believe they will disappear in a flash. More about the next challenge in a future blog. For now, thanks for following our Power Suits Art Quilt Challenge. We’ve had an unbelievable amount of fun and we hope you have, too!
Great Post Cyndi!!! I am so very glad that you won the Favorite Quilt- very much deserved!!! You really rocked this whole deal- very impressive> Can’t wait till the Studio tech class on portrait quilts!!!!
Thanks, Elizabeth! It’s a wonderful show and I thank you for your contribution to that. Loved your flowers!
Elizabeth, thanks for that. I feel a little guilty about winning the Viewers’ Choice Hands-Down Favorite award. That said, I’m also honored and happy about it. Recreating my father’s portrait in fabric was a true challenge and I’m thrilled with the outcome. I do look forward to helping others learn this technique — first in a still life and then in a portrait. Thanks again for the kind words.
Cyndi,
I would love a packet for Arts and Old Lace. My miniature reproduction quilt won 3rd place in the current Alliance for American Quilts, I also won honorable mention in their Crazy Quilt contest. Several of my quilts has traveled with Hoffman Challenge.
Sandra
Sandra,
I’ll contact you privately…
Cyndi
It’s so exciting to see all the different points of view for this challenge. Glad the opening went well. It’s exciting to see where our quilts will travel, too! If we can’t go on vacation, at least our quilts can!
Thanks so much for offering this challenge!
Jean, you’re welcome! We’ve had such a great time scheming and planning and seeing the treasures everyone has made.We’re just thrilled! Keep checking the calendar page. You never know when we’ll be able to add another venue!
I’m going to see these in Lancaster next Spring – it will be worth the trip just to see these little masterpieces up close!
I plan to be there, too! Make sure you introduce yourself.
Oh, how I would love to interpret your “Arts and Old Lace”. I started a crazy quilt group back in 2000 after working at a living history site and making a crazy quilt as a fundraiser for the site. I’ve never had a quilt entered in a major show but I’ve one a number of blue ribbons for my quilting, miniatures and penny rugs. And a couple of blue ribbon projects also earned Grand Champion ribbons. Maybe one day, I could participate in one of your challenges. 🙂
Sandi, it sounds like your quilts are fabulous. Keep your eye on my blog and contact me as soon as you hear a whisper of an idea that there may be another challenge. All of the packets for this challenge are spoken for (Wow, did they ever go fast!), but we never know what the future brings. We didn’t plan on a second challenge and here we are!
Oops! That should be “won” not “one”.
Thanks, Cyndi. Will keep my eyes on your blog. 🙂