With Needle and Thread: Little Quilts

I went to my very first quilt show every, presented by The West Pasco Quilters' Guild, and before you ask as I told the lady at the gallery I'm just a silent fan.  Much to far to pay a taxi to get to their meetings.  This was the With Needle and Thread: Little Quilts, at the Progress Energy Art Gallery and will be there until the 27th of August.  I have a great many pictures of these delightful minis, so why not sit back and enjoy my reviewing.  There are many pictures, so you'd better get a glass of tea, or a something before you sit down with me.  I will go in order as I saw them and add comments as I see fit.  Please feel free to click on anything you want to see closer.

This is as you first walk in, and I found it perfect to set the scene. 

This is a dream catcher, the roughness around the edges only added to the quilt. 

This art quilt was detailed with so many different fibers it grew more beautiful the longer you looked at it.

This crab quilt is extremely noteworthy for the crab is actually part of the hand dyed fabric.  All of the quilting serves to enrich this quilt. 

 Hand embroidered.

 This is a 3-D quilt that comes right out and pulls you in.  The background is hand detailed fabric and I loved how some of the butterflies were truly in a net.

 This was an interesting piece hand applique of which you will see another one of in a bit.

 Teeny Tiny Sunbonnet Sues, I added my thumb to give you perspective of size.

This is a personal favorite of many of the visitors to the gallery according the volunteer who was working there.  I think it's cute myself. 

Handmade matching bias tape gave this piece a nice touch. 

I believe the center of this a print, but the beautiful beading and quilting really set it above.  The bead work is all those lovely flags as well as the mainlines for the sail.  Then the quilting gave real depth. 

 Maybe I'm a nut but I always like to see how quilters constantly come up with new ways to use rickrack and this mini was no exception.

This is another piece that really sprang up off the wall.  The depth of the workmanship here can really be seen in the details. 

I thought these were just lovely, and I was delighted by this point to discover that we were alone in the gallery and the flash wasn't effected by the glass. 

 This is a swing kit, complete with the little felt swatches where you would store your needles.

I didn't notice this one right away, and thought it was two pieces but no, a quilt as a box of candies! 

 You're entering another room, see all the quilts on the wall?  I told you it was a real show.

This quilt is called 20 tiny bubbles.  I liked the real seashells and coral at the bottom but as I looked back at it I noticed all the little graduated pearls coming from the fish. 

This quilt is called the Green Eyed Monster.  The eyes were all done with seed beads that riveted me.  This quilt reminds me of like my brother would draw.  He's 11 now.  The quilting, theme, and the movement of this quilt reminds me of him and I would guess it was either done by a young artist or inspired by one. 

This one is called Remembering Guam. 

This dragon caught my eye from across the room.  It is applique but actually relief cut to show the wings.  Real talent went into this quilt. 

Here is our second medallion that I mentioned above.  The lighting washed out the purple a bit and I was certainly wishing for full spectrum lighting by the time we were here.  I think it would have been nice to have both pieces next to each other allowing a direct compare and contrast of the two artists. 

Now the curator asked me which one was my favorite and oddly it is this one.  Normally I do get into landscape quilts, but this one is different.  They are not the colors I would have selected but yet it pulls me in. There is a use of glittered fabric here that really grabs the eye.  The far lilly of the valley are seed beads but in the foreground they are tufts of rough cut fabric.   

This is a hand appliqued and hand quilted quilt.  The humming bird is especially nice along the top edge of the feathers as the hand stitching bites into the wings giving them a real nice depth.  I wondered about this clean quilt, clearly so painstakingly made.  The binding is machine stitched on, and I wondered if perhaps the quilter ran out of time. 

Now this quilt.  My friend and neighbor who was with me thought this looked like a stained glass quilt and I agree but the methodology is so different from the traditional stained glass.  The rocks - I will call them that are appliqued on with a straight stitch between 1/8" and a scant 1/4" from the edge.  The butterfly details are reverse applique with the fabric being cut away to revel the color under neath. I liked the metal and glass butterfly in the corner as well.

What do you see when you look at this quilt?  I see lots and lots of thread.  This is certainly one to see closer.  What I loved about this quilt is that while it is an abstract it all of the thread painting make it so real.  So often I would look at a quilt like this online and be completely flabbergasted at the ability and skill, but seeing it up close touched me in that I feel like it wouldn't be so far fetched to try something like this (in teeny tiny can't regret the loss of fabric someday in a year or two) kind of way. 

I believe this was started on an embroidery machine because while the beautifully satin stitched leaves could have been done on a sewing machine the "LOVE" gives it away.  The flowers though those are nice, I believe they are all ribbon embroidery.  Lovely.

This piece was nice how the binding changed through the setting sun. 

This quilt called me back, it actually has dime sized - okay maybe a bit smaller lady bugs.  See them?  They give this quilt just the right final touch. 

 This green bracelet was for sale in the display case.  I didn't ask how much it was, I'm not good about keeping things seed beads that on their string.  The artist made the box underneath for it to come in, but what really drew my eye is that it looked like little dragonflies.  For a person that loves dragonflies, this would have made a great gift.