Flood #1

Pieced and pristine

SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Association) wisdom is sent to my inbox every other day and one of the recent posts involving Australian textile and fibre artists Alison Schwabe and Jenny Bowker has become the basis of Flood #1.  They did the thinking. I got to read it and ended up in the studio. The images of dirty brown absorbing everything in its path will stay with many of us for a long time. I can remember the floods of '74 and many of the natural disasters that have occurred across the globe in the years since. I know that eventually this too will also pass.

Shiva silt

I wanted to convey an aerial and expansive view of the very beautiful Lockyer Valley area not so far from where I live - prairie points now mountains, tubes of  railways and bridges; patches of blue for the inexplicably untouched areas and everything else under the spread of mud. Small communities, towns and localities sprinkled across the landscape - represented by the smaller half-square triangles - mostly aligned and then some not.  Images also of soiled things - again the muddy silt. I've played with the quilting lines in my journal -  they are sharp and urgent, swirling around fixed objects but ever so straight and unstoppable. It's one of the great things about being a SAQA member. Thanks to Sue Dennis and her never waning encouragement, SAQA membership has provided me with exposure to many artists and ideas, lively debate, and the opportunity to grow.