Del Thomas lives in Southern California. She is a quiltmaker and a collector of contemporary/art quilts. And adopted mommy to KoKo, an eleven pound Yorkshire Terrier
Sweet Alyssum and Lantana.
Rapheolepsis indica/ Indian Hawthorne.
And a close up of the Rapheolepsis.
The exhibit at VAQG is from California Fibers, a local group that was formed in 1970 and has a limited membership of 25. The work includes quilts, tapestries, baskets, wearables. It is their first time at this new gallery.
I do enjoy visiting the redevelopment area where the Gallery is located. It was the Navy Training Center for many years, but is now being developed as "Liberty Station", a 'destination' - galleries, restaurants, stores, etc. There is a Trader Joe's grocery, Starbucks, Panera restaurant, Von's groceries.. and a number of other places open, a large church meets in one of the buildings on Sundays and there is a dance studio in operation. Many of the buildings, perhaps most, have yet to be refurbished and rented, but things have progressed since the VAQG moved in almost a year ago. And the Watercolor Society of SDiego has a lovely gallery in the same building. You can find info about the development at http://www.sandiego.gov/ntc/ or http://www.libertystation.com/
For info about the VAQG see http://www.quiltvisions.org/
The only drawback I can see (hear?) is that the airplanes from the San Diego airport take off directly overhead. It can be deafening! But the grounds are very nice with large trees, a rose garden and many buildings from the early 20th Century.
The Oceanside Museum of Art is where the Visions exhibits are held every other year. The quilts have been selected for 2008 and I was surprised that there are about the same number as previous years. It turns out that the old portion of OMA is now offices and the gift shop and all the galleries are in the new building. There appears to be only slightly more wall space than there was before. Disappointing.
I purposely did not arrive until about an hour after the opening started because I am not fond of crowds. But there were still a LOT of people visiting the galleries. The exhibit is of early 20th Century plein air paintings of the San Diego area, all are very nice and some are quite wonderful. In one small area, all by itself and with a solitary lady on guard, was a lovely Sam Maloof chair that apparently has been donated to the museum. A treasure, indeed. Altogether I had a lovely Spring day looking at art and enjoying great weather. ....and limited traffic!
This picture didn't post on yesterday's blog. It is looking northeast along I-5 south of San Onofre. In the center is another patch of Tidy-tips, Goldfields and Cream cups center right and lower right corner is wild mustard. As you can see the traffic was light when I was on this stretch of road about 4:30pm - amazing.
This is a somewhat famous image that has been placed all over the map, but was actually taken in the early spring of 2005 in a area east of Bakersfield and west of Tehachapi, CA. It appears that every wildflower that grows in the Central Valley is blooming in this valley. I can't give acknowledgment for the picture because I've seen it so many places I'm not sure who took the picture.
The flowers close to the road are a mix of Goldfields, Tidy-tips and Cream Cups - the seeds spread by the hand of man. On the hillsides the lighter yellow is wild mustard, which is not a California native, but has grown wild in the state for at least several hundred years.
