Studio Art Quilters Association is having an exhibit titled "I'm Not Crazy" which explores mental health issues. I think the title is offensive but whatever. It is the perspective or someone with mental illness, a caretaker or friend or family member of someone with mental illness. I have a very close friend who is Bipolar and is medicated to have balance in her life. This quilt is my interpretation of being bipolar-one minute she is happy, hyper bouncing off the wall and the next sad, depressed and angered. I used muted sad, dull colors to represent being depressed and, of course, the frustrated facial expression. I used bright colored fabrics with lots of chaos for the manic side's clothing, make up and jewelry. Her hair is out of control and her facial expression shouts "manic." I used lots of desciptive words on both sides of the personality in a subtle way in the background. I purposely went subtle because in society we don't want to talk about mental health issues and they are subtle and quiet in our discussions. I found there is a two sided smiley face which symbolizes Bipolar Disorder and I added it to the quilt in the lower center of the quilt.
This photo is a closeup of the depressed personality.
And this is a photo of the manic personality. She's kind of "out there!" Her expression deminds me of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland!!
Cloeup of the Bipolar symbol and a few of the background words.I embellished the manic side with hand made Sculpey clay beads, a beaded earring, rhinestones for pierced earrings, orange lame' in the hair to symbolize being wired, and some fabric paint. The intent was for excess and chaos in hair, make up, clothing and jewelry. The depressed side has a necklace made to buttons made from leather (pretty cool from a quilt show!), a few beads for the necklace and a rhinestone for the nose piercing. Both have a little fabric paint for details.The exhibit aplication is online at SAQA's website the month of May and during the summer we find out if we made the cut then the selected quilts will travel for 2 years to the various Mancuso Quilt Shows.
This quilt is not meant to represent beauty but a social issue. I was thinking of entering it in the local community art show at my library which runs through the summer but I'm not sure if the social issue would offend people. I guess art can do that sometimes...
Well I am having a month of rejections!! I applied for an article in Quilting Arts Magazine and was rejected earlier in June. My piece for the "I'm Not Crazy" for SAQA was not selected. They had 128 entries and only chose 20. I'm very bummed about this one because this subject is very personal to me and I put alot of emotion into that piece. Then I entered the Quilting Arts Magazine's Reader Challenge on Signature Color and there were over 150 entries and only 15 were chosen. I had a blast on this little 8" x 8" project including the beading around the binding. This will be a cute addition to my studio and it makes me smile. I'm just a bit unsure if I want to participate in these things for a while. It seems abstract art is trendy at the moment and representational art is on the back burner. I still love to made art and will continue.
We know it's going to be a great night with some amazing bloggers who love (love!) sewing. But wait... there's more!
This quilt began as a project at Pine Street Quilts, where I work, called Fair and Square. It is a 12 month block exchange and when it was my month I chose the required four fabrics of a floral batik, and the tone on tone magenta, dark orange and light orange. I knew I would do the placement with a large square in the middle. I did not know what I was putting in the middle when I pieced it. As I was working on the piecing it, the fabrics gave me a warm tropical vibe. This lead to a Carmen Miranda fruity type woman which was appliqued using a raw edged fused technique. I was happy to have four star blocks for the corners. When one does these block exchanges you gamble on what you will receive from others interpreting your fabric choices.
This is the detail image of the woman's face. Originally I did not have the fabric behing the eyes and lips but I it needed enhancement so I chose a few solids for the task. I have a bit of hot pink glitter for eyeliner and some orange nail polish on the lips for bling!!
Carmen Miranda worn a lot of chunky necklaces and I chose to create it with embellishments. The 3 pink rings are reused bikini swimsuit rings I couldn't throw away, and the beads are from a Hello Kitty necklace from the $1 bin at Target that I took apart to get the majenta beads and some generic Walmart beads in hot pink. The rest of the necklace was created with multi-color ribbon ruched and tacked onto the quilt. I loved the coordinating colors and thought it went well with the quilt colors. 
I remembered I have a Carmen Miranda cookie jar on my refrigerator and that made me smile!
Simple Quilted OrnamentsSUPPLIES & TOOLS:
