Monday, March 31, 2014

Love Tulip

When I put out this challenge, I called it maybe trite but when I started working on it, it really ended up as a challenge for me. While I was looking in my sketchbooks, and my heart for ideas, I came across a journal-quilt I made last year. It was worked with spraying through stencils with some tulips. And I really love tulips with their many shapes patterns and colours. And not to forget it's history. The first tulip in Norway, bloomed in the garden of an old pharmacy here in the center of Bergen more than 400 years ago.
So I had an idea, but how to interpret it. By spraying and stenciling I managed to get a piece of cloth I liked, but I also needed a focus. I went to one of my other great love: Letters, in all it's sizes and fonts. And how they can be decorative as well as have a meaning. So I stenciled a big L on top of it all and put the rest of the letters for love as a decoration on it. I hand quilted the visible tulips, machine-quilted the background and appliqued a photo-transfer of a tulip from my garden as a finishing touch.


And some close-ups:



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10 comments:

  1. MargaretMarch 31, 2014 at 1:32 AM

    Lovely! (no pun intended!)

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  2. UnknownMarch 31, 2014 at 9:30 AM

    I love the chunky hand stitching and the interesting background fabric. Everything works together so well. The fact that tulips are a symbol of love according to 'The Language of Flowers' makes your piece even more pertinent!

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  3. Julia in NZMarch 31, 2014 at 10:41 AM

    This is a great piece. The hot colours together with the purity of the white tulip show many facets of love. The use of lettering, and the hand-stitched tulips give us plenty to admire as our eyes travel over the piece.

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  4. Lyudmila YanchenkoMarch 31, 2014 at 11:52 AM

    "L" is very beautiful and looks like tulip leaves!

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  5. UnknownMarch 31, 2014 at 2:12 PM

    What a lovely complex piece of cloth you created. The design for the machine quilting creates great texture in the fabric and contrasts so well with the hand stitching and the single white tulip is the perfect focal point with it's little beads and looks like a real tulip lying across the quilt

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  6. Vivien ZepfMarch 31, 2014 at 2:36 PM

    The shapes and font you've created blend beautifully in this piece. The tulip is a perfect focal point. I love it's creamy color and the bit of history you've shared.

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  7. UnknownMarch 31, 2014 at 5:18 PM

    A very striking and effective design. A beautiful balancing of the simplicity of the tulip image and the complexity of the background fabric.

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  8. UnknownApril 1, 2014 at 12:47 PM

    Oh, wonderful colours! And the mix of machine and hand stitching creates a great effect in this piece.

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  9. UnknownApril 7, 2014 at 5:19 PM

    The vivid colours and the abstract stencils give the right background for the realistic foto of the tulip. I like the mix of machine and hand stitching.

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  10. Ann-MariApril 11, 2014 at 1:05 PM

    Greta, I just love your tulips and I have seen some of them before in your journal quilts, the shapes and the colors are beautiful.

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