2010 Summer Art Honors at Sawtooth School - Part I

From June 21 to July 2 I had the pleasure of teaching 'Surface Design - Fabric + Art Quilt' as part of the Summer Art Honors program at the Sawtooth School for Visual Art. This program, coordinated with the Forsyth County school system, is for artistically gifted middle and high school students who have been nominated by their art teachers for participation. Classes in every conceivable media are included in the curriculum and I was thrilled to be able to share my love of surface design and art quilting.

During week one students learned:

Rust Dyeing...

Several methods of Stamp Making and stamping on fabric...

Discharging...

(and this first one I found particularly interesting...it started as a solid pink fabric but when discharged it became this blue line banded by white that I thought was just the coolest thing ever!)

They learned how much fun it is to do Gelatin Plate Printing...

And they learned the tips and tricks of using fusible web.

During week two each student evaluated all of the fabrics they created in the first week, and selected what pieces they wanted to use in their art quilt. We used fusible web and fusible batting so minimize the amount of sewing required. Some of them had experience in sewing and some did not, but everyone learned some basic hand sewing skills. Since we met in the fibers studio, there was a wall full of every colored thread and weaving yarns to choose from for stitching materials. My only criteria for them was size limitation (based on the piece of batting they received, about 18 x 22), that it be constructed of three layers held together with stitching, and that a recognizable piece of fabric from each of the surface design techniques that they learned be incorporated. Beyond that, their vision and imagination was the limit! They all did a great job!!

This is Lynda's piece...love the hand bead work and the discharge pattern. She loves to do hand sewing and actually pieced her fabrics together.

This is Nicole's piece...love the coffee cups, indeed, music to me! She did a nice job of balancing the use of her fabrics and color placement.

This is Rachel's piece...love her use of color and depth of image layering on her stamped fabrics

This is Kati's piece...her rust dyeing turned out very cool as did her alien stamp, and she did a great job using hand stitching to create texture

This is Clarissa's piece...an experienced sewer, she used some machine stitching in her piece in addition to hand work. Love how she used her fabrics to create this landscape (And she plans to hang it in her dorm next year when she goes off to college)

At the end of the session all of the student's work was displayed and an open house reception was held in their honor. It was so inspiring to see what everyone in the program created!

It really was fun to work with these kids. I'm thinking there are some new additions to the art quilt world now, don't you?