Structures #7
Months ago I said I would post a photo of structures #7. I put it off and then the traveling show that it is included in, Elements from the Front Range Contemporary Quilters, got a (much deserved) bad semi-public review on a very large art quilt mailing list a month ago. You can read Rayna Gillman’s thoughts about the show on her blog in this post.
So now I have more to say about this quilt and am glad I waited.
First the quilt - then the comments.
Structures #7 ©2001 28"x30":
This quilt was made while I lived in New Zealand for 5 months in 2001. You can read more about that wonderful time in this post.
I would spend many hours sitting at the beach watching the seaweed float and shift as the water would surge up and down smashing the plant against the rocks. I found it rather hypnotic.
This quilt doesn’t quite capture the motion but I really love the colors and the shapes and it brings me back to that time. It is an abstraction of the real thing and but that is what my art is about: capturing the essence of moments, thoughts and feelings that are important to me. What others read into the work is also wonderful. The structures series is about walls and fences, so I’m not sure how the seaweed snuck in but it’s okay with me.
So on to the criticisms of this show. These comments were made by a contemporary art collector that saw this show in the company of an art quilter. His major criticisms were that most of the works in this travelling exhibit didn’t demonstrate good design and the maker didn’t display mastery of their technique.
I’ve seen this show in person and I think his comments are valid. I found the show to be rather poor and it got a lukewarm reception when it opened in Colorado in 2003. Bad group quilt shows are a topic for another time, this post is about Structures #7.
I’m embarrassed by this piece. While I like the design of the quilt top and think it’s an okay design (not great, nothing spectacular but not bad), the quilting on this quilt is terrible. I knew it was bad. Yet I entered it in a show anyway. It definitely indicates to the viewer that I have no mastery of my technique. Ugh - I pride myself on my craftmenship and I have noone to blame but myself for this.
Detail - I think it looks like a 4 year old tried to quilt this piece - it’s sloppy:
This was a failed attempt to try to speed up the amount of time it takes to quilt a piece by using a short cut (I was trying to do straight line quilting with the feed dogs down - which means I had less control of the machine - I’m not very good at this and I should have done a test piece - realized it was bad and tossed it and then quilted this piece in my normal way.)
I think back and wonder why I entered this into a national travelling exhibit. Best I could come up with is because I lacked the foresight to consider that this quilt is travelling around the country for several years representing me and all art quilters as a work of art. At the time I was entering too many juried shows and saved my newest and best work for shows that wouldn’t put the work "out of circulation" for 3-4 years. I entered my older, less successful, pieces in this show.
I now realize how short sighted and really rather stupid that decision was. This travelling show is going to museums where I am represented by substandard work. The juried shows that I thought I needed to save the good work for are now long over and forgotten.
Part of me believes this was a good example of being too tied up into the product and not the process of making art. Ed Maskovish recently posted about perfection on his blog and I think had I learned the lesson his instructor was trying to teach them about growth I wouldn’t have made this mistake. I let the quilt be too precious even after I ruined it with the quilting.
I know when the quilt returns home in a few years it will not see the light of day again unless I fix it.
The only redeeming thought about this mistake is that these quilts were made prior to my divorce so they have my married name on them. So hopefully noone will make the connection!
But it still reflects badly on all art quilts. I think showing no work is better than showing bad work if we truly want art quits to be accepted as fine art.
Posted by Lisa in: Abstract Contemporary Textile Art, Musings
Gabrielle said,
July 31, 2006 @ 6:34 pm
Do you feel that the quilting is bad because the lines aren’t straight and you had intended them to be straight? Why do you want the lines to be straight?
Could having the lines be more fluid echo the lines made when you cut the fabric without a ruler?
Lisa Call said,
July 31, 2006 @ 6:38 pm
I don’t look for my quilting lines to be perfectly straight. I do want them to echo the other shapes in the quilt. But not straight is not the same as sloppy.
In Structures #7 the lines are wobbly. They don’t echo the edges of the pieces - they weave back and forth hoping to not fall off the edge. There is no purpose to them.
This is an example of my latest quilting (click for more detail). The lines are far from straight and parallel - but to me they look like they have intention.
The lines in #7 are mannered - as in "b : having an artificial or stilted character <passages …so mannered as to be unintelligible >".
Lisa Call said,
July 31, 2006 @ 7:37 pm
I made a post a while back titled Quality of Line. The comments I made in that post are also relevant to what I feel is wrong with the quilting lines of this piece.
Gabrielle said,
July 31, 2006 @ 9:20 pm
Thanks for the explanation. I was trying to understand why you are so unhappy with the quilting. I think that the quilting on this quilt isn’t as good as the second one you posted but I also don’t think the quilting on Structures #7 is terrible. You are too hard on yourself.
alisons schwabe said,
August 1, 2006 @ 5:17 am
Lisa - thanks for sharing your quilting comments, all of them, with us. I felt though, like Rayna, that you are being prety hard on yourself. I feel sure that what we are seeing by comparing the earlier with one of your very recent pieces is a development in both actual skill level ( the recent quilting is even and very very disciplined yet organic looking ) and a change in role of the quilting, to where it has become another actual layer of surface design superimposed over the piecing, it doesn’t just echo the piecing/line shapes as the earlier quilting did. In other words, your work shows an interesing development which would not have been possible without the work you accomplished between the actual dates on which you made these two very different pieces.
Cathy said,
August 1, 2006 @ 5:17 am
I think the quilting gives the quilt the motion that you mentioned was missing. The little dips and curves among the seaweed and waves…
JMHO!
Lisa Call said,
August 1, 2006 @ 6:17 am
Thanks everyone for the kind words.
Alison - I wish what you are saying was true. But it’s not. This is a detail of Structures #4 - the other piece in this traveling exhibit - quilted as I normally quilted my work back then (probably finished within the same month):
This quilting isn’t as close together as what I do today but it was always intended to be another design superimposed over the piecing.
The truth is I was lazy with Structures #7 - I knew it at the time. It’s not about growth - I can accept the growth from #4 to my recent work and not cringe about the changes. But I can’t just pass off the quilting on #7 as anything other than sloppiness on my part and a bad decision.
I agree - I have high standards for my work and I am very hard on myself. But I also don’t necessarily think that is a bad thing. Tolerating sloppy work isn’t in my nature and it keeps me striving to improve.
Sally said,
August 1, 2006 @ 8:33 am
Lisa, I agree with you. #4 is quilted much more thoughtfully than #7 and current work is even more effective in terms of quilting. Is good you realize the larger lesson of not showing anything that’s not the best you could do at the time. Being truthful with yourself is the only way to know you can trust your intuition, and not be taken in by generous thoughts. Your experience has provided a good lesson for everyone reading your blog — thank you. What you’re talking about are simply facts and do show how much you’ve learned about being an artist. You can be very pleased with that. And at some point just laugh at the experience!
Karoda said,
August 1, 2006 @ 11:17 am
Lisa, I definitely can see where you’re coming from and I take your point to mean for me that even skilled artists do make mistakes in judgements and have to live with the consequences…this is what I appreciate most about what you’re stated…and its a lesson learned the hard way which always leaves a deeper impression, eh?
Kathie said,
August 1, 2006 @ 6:14 pm
It’s all just so subjective. I don’t mind the wobbly lines a bit, and I prefer wobbly to straight any day of the week. Still, if you disappointed yourself and didn’t achieve what you had hoped to achieve, the thing to do is to analyze, learn, and use as an Instructive Experience.
Omega said,
August 2, 2006 @ 12:55 am
It is interesting how difficult it can be to acknowledge that what one has spent hours on is actually below one’s standard of acceptability. Throwing things out sometimes can lose something with potential, but perhaps whenever there is doubt we should put things in a cupboard to be brought out only when we have just completed something we are proud of, so that we can make a more dispassionate judgment - or if a real possibility for valid rescue occurs.
What I really like about Structures #7 are the colour combination, and the gentlest of motion which can be seen in the slight curves of the darkest pieces. I love what you have made from the seaweed. Thank you for sharing it and its inspiration as well as discussing what is an element of development which is too often swept under the rug.
Felicity said,
August 2, 2006 @ 2:02 am
I found your post very interesting (I saw your comment on Omega’s blog before reading this). I don’t think you are being hard on yourself at all. It’s clear you are a very disciplined person and your art reflects that. I’m not in your league or any or your other commentators but I do understand how it feels to not do your best and how that feels inside. And as Omega mentioned the lack of discrimination but plenty of enthusiasm does not excuse poor art. There is a lot of back slapping in the quilt world if you toe the line (better not elaborate and get into trouble) but you are listening to your own voice, I admire that.
Patty Altier said,
August 2, 2006 @ 10:31 am
Structure #7 would only be a failure if you didn’t learn anything. When you know better, you do better. The colors are wonderful so when you get it back don’t hide it in a closet. It could be one of those portable projects that you take it apart when you a waiting for your kids, the doctor, etc. then quilt it again.
Lesly said,
August 2, 2006 @ 3:59 pm
Lisa … you are an expert in your field and if you are not happy with #7 then I will believe what you are saying! I do not have the knowledge of your art form to comment.
However, I have framed and exhibited paintings that I knew it my heart were not the best I could do at a particular time so I understand how you are feeling about the whole thing. Its a lesson that many of us have to live with (like saying something really stupid in public!), and hopefully we learn from it and move on - as you have done.
I will remember your comments …. thank you for sharing them. And I am glad for your sake that the quilt has your married name on it and not Lisa Call!
Lisa Call said,
August 3, 2006 @ 5:08 am
Thanks all for the supportive comments. This has been an interesting conversation and I appreciate all of your input. I have lots to think about.