A day at the library - planning for success

Spent the majority of today at the Ipswich Library at Orion / Springfield. Booked myself a quiet room for a few hours of serious research and the relaxed for a few more hours in a general area for those needing quiet time.

It gave me a chance to think about how I carve out time and need to hold on to time for planning and the "business side" of being a creative. I'm utilising some terrific resources through the Make Big Art group and really focussing on how to build a sustainable arts practice, build confidence in producing my art and eventually, I'll participate in the Greenhouse group and work with Lisa Call to develop a deeper body of work.

The library resources are simply fantastic with multiple areas to work, focus and participate - meeting rooms, learning spaces technology and old fashioned chairs in which to immerse oneself in a good read. My idea for a perfect day.

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Making progress Trees #2

It's all in the background - designing substrate

Scaling up an image of the Brisbane River to develop the substrate for a new art quilt. Each square needs to be 6cm x 6cm to make a finished size of 5 cm square. I created a "to scale" model of the finished quilt on drafting paper. I printed an image of the river (attribution below) and then scaled it up to get a fairly accurate flow across the quilt. The substrate rightly tells the background story. It is the foundation on which the main elements or features reside. So it isn't the "hero" of the piece - it needs to be recognised and visible without overwhelming the piece. I can now easily identify which squares hold a section of the river and start to experiment on piecing, applique, fusing, printing, and painting to learn which gives the best outcome for the substrate. (Brisbane River original image: Magpie Shooter; edited version Paulguard at en.wikipedia https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/indix.php?curid=9724127) My foundation piece might well end u...

The mess before the beauty

The excavator's words have stuck in my head, rent free. ' I have to make one hell of a mess before it can become beautiful. There is no beautiful end without the mess '. Or words to that effect. The retaining walls at the back of the house have to be finished before anything else can happen in the yard - and in between downpours, a few expletives and more rain, it has beena testing time for all involved in the construction. I thought about his words - and the effort of making a quilt from scratch. The planning, drawing, testing, dyeing, playing, creating, starting again, creating and the final 'ah ha'. There is so much 'mess' before a quilt is resolved becomes a thing of meaning and beautiful in its own way. Blessed are the excavators.

Ali George Artist

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