Design

I finished Caution the other day — the Rwandan child peeking around the arm of an adult. He was difficult to photograph — it was hard to keep some of the browns in his face from having a greenish tint.

Then I started on Arminta. I have a very old family photo album with pictures taken between 1890 & 1910. There is a wonderful picture of a woman in it named Arminta Patterson. We haven’t been able to place her in the family tree but suspect she was a cousin of my great grand-mother. She had such wonderful curves in her face that I wanted to see what I could do with her.

The original is a sepia print so I have license to color — which is freeing but also a little terrifying. Let’s start with the face.

I have seven — yes seven — values in her face. That is a big number to find values for. In fact, halfway in, I added another fabric for a smoother transition between two values. Even better, I managed to do it within my current stash.

This is the first & second value — her face is still a mystery.

With the third value, you begin to see the outline of her face. I know — that green print is a strange choice — but it works.

The fourth value is darker and you begin to feel the depth of her face. You can see her nose, where her eyes will be, and the curve of her cheek and chin.

The fifth value gives us personality. She has a very distinctive look about her.

The sixth value shows us the determination in her expression.

The sixth and final value completes her ear, her nose, and her mouth.

With the eyes added, she all but leaps off the fabric at you.

I am uncertain how to do her hair. It was dark — but like I said, I have license to color. The final choice will contribute quite a bit to the mood of the piece and will be the color choice upon which most of the other colors are chosen.

At this point, I have added the collar of her shirt — but most of it is white so it won’t show up — so we progress to her scarf. I intentionally made it blue — because her eyes will be blue — because the background will be blue. This shows the 1st 2 layers.

It starts to make more sense in the 3rd value.

Fourth . . . .

And finally fifth value . . . . . (Notice that I finally ripped off the eyes — they  just weren’t working.)

At this point I add her bomber jacket. Because of everything else, I kept it fairly simple — only 3 values.

Notice her eyes. They’re not right. The photograph was no help — she is actually squinting in the original — and all is lost. I added the irises when I did my design and thought — I’ll deal with that later. Well now later has come — and this doesn’t look quite right.

I wish I had copies of everything I tried. I used what I had done on past eyes to help me — and really nothing looked right. The one below is getting a little better — you needed the contrast of the sclera (the “white” part of the eye) — but it’s too much. (I used the lightest skin tone for the sclera.)

This next one is better. I took the darkest skin tone and wrapped it around most of the eye. The deep contrast to the sclera gives the impression of depth — which you need in an eye.

I also softened her mouth with a pinky brown. I usually add a dark color to indicate the recess of the inner mouth — but I chose to soften it by adding some lips. I haven’t done this before. I usually stay with the normal skin tones & quilt in the shape of the mouth. In this instance, the dark red shouted too much so I added a small line above and below it (except in the corner facing away from us).

Did I get it right? Hmmmmm. Well it seems better. I ripped off the white glint I sometimes put in the eye — it gave her a strange look. I think the sclera makes her bright eyed enough. I worried about doing that since she is so gaunt and withdrawn in the original — but I took artistic license. It’s allowed.

Amelia also had large teeth. Hopefully when I quilt it that will come across.

I’ve had many people ask me how I make my quilts, and the answer is — one piece at a time. You break everything down into workable areas — or really into color families.

The piece that I’m currently working on is Amelia Earhart. When I was designing the piece, I didn’t like the picture of the plane in the background — so I took a different picture of her plane and put it in the background — moving it so that it accentuated her silhouette.

I decided to start with the plane. The plane itself is gray — but gray is a spectrum from white to black. I chose fabrics in a range of values in that color range. I used the actual foundation fabric as the white and started building from there. With the first layer of gray, it’s difficult to see the left wing and engine.

The next value give more definition to the object.

And as I add the layers of values, the image begins to emerge.

The final layer shows all of the details. (Keep in mind that this lays flat on a table. If I don’t stand on my tip toes when I take the picture, the camera adds a shade to the picture. I don’t always remember to make myself tall when I take the picture. Because It’s on a table, there is also some distortion in the shapes that you’ll see when I finally hang the piece vertically.)

Amelia stands in the middle — with the engine & wings on either side of her. This is the beginning of the right side.

And this is what it looks like completed.

It still looks unfinished — but most of that blank space is where Amelia will go.

I’m actually done except for her bomber jacket and the sky in the background but I decided that I would show you this in pieces — by color family — to show you how I work it out in my head. The next part will be about her face — and then her hair — and then her scarf — and hopefully by then, her jacket.