PIQF 2011 10-20-11

I'm finding myself in a time crunch - trying to do too many things in a day.  Tonight I will just post a few quilts and hope tomorrow will allow more time for Blogging.  Thank you for your comments, I'm glad you are enjoying the pictures from this huge Quilt Festival.  Somewhere I read how many quilts were displayed in this 20th Anniversary year, but I can't find it now.  Maybe six hundred?  More than I could see in two days, I know I missed some good ones
 
I have two corrections to make on my 10-18-11 post:
The first is that I failed to tell you that the fabulous quilting on the raffle quilt for which I purchased tickets was done by Holly Casey of King City, CA.


And the 2nd correction/addition is this picture of the back of "Simply Santa Fe" by Cindy Seitz-Krug, which I posted on 10-18-11.  I took the picture out of order when I had the chance and didn't move it into its rightful place before I posted.  Although the back is not mentioned on the label, the white glove lady was showing it because it is hand stenciled with artist cut stencils and is quite lovely.

Jan is a friend from Surfside Quilters Guild who does excellent hand applique and especially enjoys the Piece O' Cake patterns.  This quilt received a 3rd place ribbon at this show.  Congratulations, Jan.  You deserve all the awards you receive, you are such an inspiration to quilters near and far.  

This is the only picture I took of the quilts in the "7" special exhibit.  I am an admirer of Eileen Lauterborn's quilts and have tried to purchase a couple, but someone has always been in line in front of me.  I'm not as fond of the colors in this one as some of her previous quilts I have seen.

 

 

I am just too tired to stay up any later - I'll try again tomorrow if I can find the time.  There are pictures of some of the Special Exhibits and the World Quilt Competition.

PiQF 2011 10-18-11

The theme of PIQF this year was "Time", which explains why so many of the labels have references to time.  I've always found the themes rather ambiguous and I know people who use an existing quilt and weave the theme into the statement with some pretty vague language.  Personally, I would rather know why they chose the particular design or color or technique or.........! 

Zena Thorpe makes exquisite hand appliqued,h and embroidered and hand quilted quilts.  Each is a special treasure to which she devotes a great deal of time. 

Perhaps it was twenty years ago that Nancy Crow switched to her "free cutting" technique.  At that time I thought Ruth McDowell's piecing techniques were the "new bold" leader.  It took me to the end of the 90s to try out "free cutting" with any seriousness.  I like what Sylvia has done on this quilt - even the heavy border seems to work. 

I lightened this image to show the quilting lines better. 

This is quite a large piece and the winner of the Best of Show in the World Quilt Competition XV.   

 

Another machine quilting tour de force.  But at least the quilting is not at odds with the basic quilt design.

 

 

I don't know how much money I have spent on raffle quilt tickets and I have never won one.  So, five or six years ago I pretty much just gave up.  But this one really appeals to me.  And again, the quilting relates beautifully to the design of the piecing - it was quilted by Holly Casey of King City, CA.  The pattern is very much like Ruth McDowell's "Painted Daisy" design in her 1994 book "Symmetry: A Design System for Quiltmakers."   But not exactly.

Friends usually chide me for not including many traditional quilts when I take pictures at QShows, so I looked for what I think are good examples of what is being done today.  I think there were more traditional quilts this year, but Innovative Wall quilts were the largest category.

I find the quilting motif on the right side with little puffs and curls especially pleasing.

There are always lizards, geckos, iguanas, etc., in big shows, but there did seem to be an abundance at PIQF this year.  They are quite colorful and usually very nicely quilted with their warts and bumps.

 

I will continue with the PIQF pictures until I have shown them all.

PIQF 2011 10-14-11

Continuing with photos taken at PIQF on Thursday.  We did not go to Santa Clara today, but instead visited Back Porch Fabrics in Pacific Grove and had lunch at The Red House.  Both were wonderful, as always!

Click on images for enlargements.

Gorgeous trees on an equally gorgeous background.   Lovely color and excellent work on the fir trees.  The branches are done with FMQ on net (and presumably Solvy or some such material). 

As you can see, they are very three dimensional.

Along the bottom edge they are also very thick.  Great effect.

Simple machine applique with straight stitching very close to the edge of each piece gives hard edges to the trees in this work.  I am somewhat bothered by the trees lean to the center, but it is a peaceful quilt.

Odd place to put a fat T-pin - right in the middle of the quilt name.  Who hangs these quilts anyway?

This is a delightful "modern" quilt with nice color - but I would call it pastel, not bright.

I was not familiar with the work of Holly Casey until I saw a raffle quilt from the King City quilt guild on display at PIQF yesterday.  But many of my friends up here know her gift with a long-arm machine and take her their quilts to be quilted.  The raffle quilt struck me especially because the quilting has something to do with the design of the quilt instead of being a completely different "layer".  Then I saw that Holly has other quilts at the show and I looked for them in particular.

This is another good example of the quilt design and the machine quilting design relating to each other.  This quilt shows uniquely New Zealand motifs and.....

...so does the quilting.  Lovely.

This crazy quilt by Cathy Hoover won first place for Embellishment.  Like the crazy quilt made in the late 19th Century it includes ribbons, buttons, and charms, along with other trims and the great Koi border.

An amazing tour de force in support of the people of Japan whose lives were changed forever in the earthquake and tsunami. 

The white diagonal chain is to keep footprints off the bottom edge of the quilt.  It is very large.

I had a few more quilts here, but Blogger declined to post them.  I am going back to Santa Clara tomorrow, so there will be many more pictures - at least through next Saturday.