Last week I wrote the blog post Teach = Learn . I sent out a formal plea for student work and many of you resonded. Thank you! These students have agreed to let me share their work, and I am honored to do so. One of the most exciting things about teaching is seeing what my students will do with the information I give them. Here are the students, the organization who brought me to teach, their quilt(s) and what they have to say about them.

Name-Joan Spencer

Guild—Santa Clara Quilt Association
Workshop—Abstraction through Color, Pattern, and Repetition


There are two main awakenings involved in this piece called God’s Wake Up Call.  One, is the germination and growth of flowers and plants from seeds in the dark depths of rich earth. 

There is joy from their bursting forth with a vast variety of color, pattern and beauty.  The other is the dawn of a new day bringing the sun’s glorious light to dispel the black darkness of night.

Name—Wendy AS Hoag
Guild—Santa Clara Quilt Association
Workshop—Abstraction through Color, Pattern, and Repetition

Piano Razzle Dazzle was designed for my daughter Ashley.

She filled our house with years of piano magic. The quilt design evolved after seeing her most recent body art that was inspired by ship’s camouflage during WWI called dazzle painting.

The dazzle made it difficult to estimate a target’s range, speed and direction.

Jazz draws many parallels to dazzle taking you on newly found journeys that often alter speed, perception, and direction leaving you in a different place.

Emma Mae’s Trombone was inspired by my daughter Emma Mae’s colorful musical journey with her trombone. Emma performed with several jazz bands, the San Jose JazzSociety HS All-stars and Straw Hats Traditional Jazz Band. The design and technique evolved during a Maria Shell workshop, using some of Emma Mae’s favorite colors and her beloved trombone.

Both Piano Razzle Dazzle and Emma Mae’s Trombone will be shown in the Jazz Impressions exhibition at the San Jose Quilt and Textile Museum <http://www.sjquiltmuseum.org/upcoming-exhibitions/> July 8, 2016 – August 21, 2016

Name—Jan Soules

Guild—Santa Clara Quilt Association < <http://www.scvqa.org/>
Workshop—Abstraction through Color, Pattern, and Repetition

High Voltage is a rendition of buildings along the Las Vegas strip.  I cropped my original photo at an angle to give the buildings more interest and obviously changed the colors.  I wanted to emphasize the high energy of the locale!

NAME—Kate Yates

Guild—South Florida Modern Quilt Guild
Workshop—Making Prints out of Solids

I made this quilt for the Modern Quilt Guild’s Fabric Challenge. The challenge was to use the Sashing Stash fabric to make a modern quilt. I’d never worked with fabric like this before—the prints on the fabric are actual quilt blocks like flying geese and half-square triangles and I wasn’t sure where to start.

I bought the solids without a plan, but after taking Maria’s workshop on Making Prints Out of Solids, I realized these fabrics would be great for making prints.

I enjoyed making a tartan at the workshop, and I thought these prints would look great woven in with the other fabrics. I pieced this quilt without using a ruler, and cut everything with scissors. 

I finished it with handquilting and facing.

NAME—Pam Roco

Guild—South Bay Area Modern Quilt Guild <>
Workshop—Making Prints out of Solids

I began Triangles for Maria in the workshop I took with her in November 2015. It was machine quilted by me on my home sewing machine in a hanging diamond pattern.

Triangle Collage is inspired by a Kaffe Fassett quilt, African Collage, pp. 68-73 in his book, Shots and Stripes, Stewart, Tabori & Chang, New York, 2013.   

Miro Triangles was quilted by me on my home sewing machine, with a little hand-embroidery.  There were some puckers in the machine quilting which I had to cover up with chain-stitch embroidery, which is how I got started making whimsical little doodles in the style of Joan Miro, the Spanish surrealist painter.

Triangle Grid expands beyond the grey border into space.

All of these quilts are original designs, and they all contain at least some recycled fabric (sheets, shirts, whatever I can find that isn’t shot and has a nice print, color, or texture).  After I finished the first quilt, Triangles for Maria, one thing let to another, and it became a series.  I could see myself working with triangles for a long time into the future.  You never know where a workshop will lead…

Thank you students for taking the time to share your work with all of us. I am now completely inspired to get in my studio and make something as fresh and full of energy as they have.

28 Jun This entry was published on June 28, 2016 at 4:36 PM. It’s filed under Uncategorized and tagged Abstraction through Color, and Repetition, Making Prints out of Solids, Pattern. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.