Dispatches
October 2006

Did you remember to send in your registration for QBL 2007? If not, do so soon! The classes fill up fast. It is never too early to plan, especially as memories of QBL 2006 begin to fade. I feel like a year has passed since then, as I am sure many of you do. What a two weeks it was! And the HEAT!! The good part about all those hot days in a row is that everyone looked out for each other and tried to make the best of it. Many, many kudos to the vendors as well, who kept a sense of humor through it all. Since I have not experienced that many hot days in my 17 years at QBL, maybe it will be 17 years until we see it again.

DISPATCHES returns with many of the same features this year. Updates on the faculty, accomplishments of the participants, the design challenge and, of course, the book lists.

Special 2007 QBL Quilt Challenge
Teachers In The News
Design Exercise
Books to Consider

Special 2007 QBL Quilt Challenge

We encourage you to participate in the “Impressions of QBL” QBL Quilt Challenge for 2007. Interpret your personal feelings and experiences about attending QBL using any technique. Your quilt should between 24 to 30 inches per side with a 3 inch sleeve.

Get going, get thinking, and get quilting!!!!!!!!!

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Teachers In The News

The 2007 faculty includes several new members this year, and it happens two of them are men! I will be doing extended bios on them in upcoming issues; for now here are some tidbits to peak your interest.

Bob Adams, from Lafayette Indiana, has a wonderful web site at http://www.bobadamsart.com. This year has been a busy one. He had work in several juried shows including Quilt=Art=Quilt at the Schweinfurth, Art Quilts at the Sedgewick in Philadelphia, and Expressions: The Art Quilt at Ricky Timms Art Quilt Studio & Gallery in Colorado. In addition, he has been invited to participate in "Men of Biblical Proportions", a traveling show of men from the Bible done by male quilt artists and "Taking a Stand: Voices in Fiber" at the Translation Gallery in Denver. Bob’s recent publications are numerous, and include an article in the Summer issue of Quilting Arts magazine. His quilt entitled Lunar No. 6: Harvest Moons was included in Quilt National 2005, and in July of 2006 he taught at Nancy Crow’s Timber Barn. This fall Bob is a visiting artist at the University of Kentucky. It will be exciting to see what his students create next summer!

Bill Kerr’s company Fun Quilts has received considerable national attention in 2006. Feature articles have appeared in TIME magazine (June 12, 2006), Chicago Magazine (July, 2006), The New York Times (August 31, 2006), Country Living (July & October, 2006) and in the current issue of dwell magazine. The April 2007 issue of American Patchwork & Quilting will feature a story on their studio and work. Fun Quilts will launch its fifth line of fabric for Free Spirit at the International Quilt Festival in Houston. The new line is called “Mendhi”. Bill Kerr also has an interesting web site with lots of information and pictures of their fabric lines. Check it out at www.funquilts.com. One of the most interesting features of Fun Quilts, is that for every ten quilts they sell, they donate one to charity. Bob will have quilts available for sale at the "One of a Kind" show in Chicago in December, and at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in New York City in May, 2007. Cleary Bill will be another great addition to the QBL faculty.

Anna Hergert of Anna Hergert Design & Fibre Art will be coming to QBL from Alberta, Canada. Anna has a wonderful newsletter, which can be found at www.fibreartnetwork.com/Gallery/MP-AnnaHergert.htm. Her opera coat was on the cover of the September 30, 2006 of ed the magazine. For information about the Opera Coat exhibit and pictures of Anna’s entry, visit http://www.albertacraft.ab.ca/pages/exhibits/opera_coat/index.htm. Her website is www.annahergert.com, and is also full of great information

Katie Pasquini Masopust just received her contract from C&T publishing for her new book Creating Abstract Designs which is what she will be teaching at QBL. Katie says, "maybe some of the students will be able to get a piece done in time to be included in the book!" That’s a great challenge!

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Design Exercise

1. Divide a 12" x 18" piece of light-colored paper into a grid of 24 three inch squares. That would be 6 squares across and 4 squares down.
2. In each of the squares on the top and down the left side draw simple shapes. If you love to piece with straight lines, use straight lines & shapes with straight sides. If fusing is your favorite technique, go crazy! Just keep these squares very simple.
3. Fill in the remaining squares by combining a top square with its corresponding left side square. Completely fill in all the remaining squares in the same vertical/horizontal sequence. You will start at the top left and finish at the bottom right.
4. Either cut a 3" window with another piece of paper, cut your original into 3" squares, or if you want to continue to see how each square developed, photocopy the page then cut it up.
5. Do you see block designs you might use? Quilting patterns? Could you alter one of the squares to create a whole design?
6. Most of all have fun!! This is a great warm up exercise. If 12"x18" is too big, start with a smaller page.

Adapted by K Schmidt from Design Synectics

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Books to Consider

I had the unique experience at QBL this past summer of having two book lists generated. The first one is from Jeannette DeNicolis Meyer’s class, and I am happy to be able to share it here. This was a fabulous class full of lots of interesting women, and the list of books reflects that. (If I met you in class, here is the list, finally, and remember the long & winding road!)

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Have news and information to share, send it to Kathy at (new email) qblnews@gmail.com.

See you in a few weeks!
Kathy

Past Dispatches
June 2006
April 2006
February 2006
November 2005
June 2005
April 2005
February 2005
October 2004