Quilt Gallery

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

In this quilt, I was interested in depicting the blur and tumult of the explosive start of the race.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Fused appliqué; machine quilted
Design Source: Original design

Bicycles are beautiful mechanical machines. This depicts the start of a race where the riders are leaping off the lip of the gate into the air. Where the 100-Yard Dash was the exploration of movement and blur, this is the visual enjoyment of the suspension of the moment, where the race is still, literally, up in the air.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I liked the shape of Fencers so much, I thought I would do another long banner. One of the pleasures of doing this quilt was inventing the team uniforms. The cloud of ice shavings thrown up by the skates are layers and layers of netting.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Fused appliqué; machine quilted
Design Source: From the photo collection of Chris Watts, with permission from his parents, Kathleen Watts and Howard Grenfell

In my quest for non-traditional sports, I was so pleased to be offered images from the family of a young man who had been an expert rock and mountain climber. Using specific photographs has changed the techniques I am using to depict the athlete. Details are becoming more important in creating the image. Look at the tools of his rack—so much fun to create.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Fused
Design Source: Original design

Well, I had to do a skier.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

The shape of this quilt is a direct design choice from the shape of the fencer’s lunge. As in Puck Drop, I used the barest background so the athletes are highlighted.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I tend to work small, so in this quilt, I wanted to enlarge my figures to almost life-size. I chose a non-realistic background with some suggestions of the lines of the running lanes and chose the outfits of the runners to be bright to stand out against the brilliance of the silk.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Permission from the family of David Friedland for use of the family photograph

A friend’s father was a bodybuilder and gymnast in the 1940s and 50s. She gave me permission to use a family photo of her dad (the fellow in the red suit). I’ve changed a lot about the original image, but because the figures were real people, not figments of my imagination, I felt I needed to try to portray them as closely as possible. The quilting is also an exploration of techniques learned in Paula Kovarik’s quilting class.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

In this piece, I’m taking the figure out of the realistic by using the bold patterned background. The stride of the hockey player down the ice is suggested in the swoop of the pattern. After the rather anonymous faces of my athletes, I thought I would add more detail to make the figure more individual.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

This quilt continues my working question of how to depict movement in a static image. After the struggles with the Snowboarder background, I again wanted to attempt a realistic background, which also suggests the movement of the athletes.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

This was my first athlete quilt. I fell in love with the beauty of the velodrome as the backdrop for the intense psychological and emotional tension of the individual sprint race. The two bicyclists start at uneven places, and the first part of the race is the agonizingly slow contest of who will break for the curve of the velodrome first.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I return to the velodrome here, and the love of bicycles. In this quilt, I was creating a wallpaper of figures, using the angle of the riders on the velodrome wall. In another way to explore movement, I did not portray the figures fully within the quilt edge, implying movement into and out of the frame of the quilt.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Fused appliqué; machine quilted
Design Source: Original design

I love finding moments of the highest psychological tension for athletes, and the split second of time between the puck leaving the hand of the linesman and the players’ first movement is one of those moments. Hockey is a beautiful sport, and all of the uniform colors set against the white of the ice is one of the reasons.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

Here, I continue to play with a non-realistic background. The contrast of color (red against green) helps to focus on the beauty of the human body.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I love the danger of the lean of short-track skaters. In this quilt, I stripped down the background and the shapes of the figures so they become almost abstract. I wanted to see if, with the least amount of information, they would still depict emotion. This quilt, I think, is most successful from a distance.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I am eager to explore more non-traditional sports, and this is my first attempt. I hoped to catch the breath of danger combined with the relaxation of the body as if he is comfortable with a state of imbalance.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

I love ski jumping! One of the most thrilling things to see is the leap of the athlete into the air. How do they have the courage to do that? After my explorations of movement with Hurdlers and Snowboarder, this image returns to a static picture where the jumper is suspended.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Fused appliqué; machine quilted
Design Source: Original Design

In this quilt, the importance of the background was key to suggesting speed and movement. Initially, I worked hard on trying to create a realistic hillside background, but the more I did, the less movement I saw in the quilt. Instead, I scrapped the whole thing and chose a single fabric for a background.

Monterey, CA USA
Techniques: Machine pieced and quilted; fused appliqué
Design Source: Original design

The romance of a road race...