Friday, March 11, 2011

Personal signature or professional error


There are many ways to sign your work -meaning quilt or piece of art- many artists sign on the back, some sign on the front. Some do secret hidden signatures under the binding as well as a big label on the back of their quilt. A painter I know paints the same house in each of her paintings as her own personal signature. A few quilters will always put a frog or other design on each piece they make. Some artists make what they call 'professional errors', by this I mean they use a traditinal design and make a consistent small error, not easily detectable, but enough that if they or someone else were to look at their work years later it would be the defining mark that is distinctly their own. Many lace makers use this technique, as of course their work has no place for a signature.


Why do I ramble on, well, I was machine quilting this lovely little Flood Relief quilt, and got a bit excited and stitched straight throuh what I had designated as my finish line, its right at the bottom in the middle, it did not need to be undone, but instead made a start place for the border quilting. This is not you would expect, and it makes this little quilt a bit different and special, nobody else would have done this, or maybe they wold have undone it to make it 'perfect'


Maybe my professional error is to quilt the unexpected!


I sometimes leave little quilted messages in quilts for specific people, it's their challenge to find them. Maybe you should try it to liven up your piece and make it a little more personal. A personal challenge to the quilter in you!


It is fun to quilt someone elses work, but a bit daunting at the same time,would they have done it like this, will they like it? More on that another day


Jane

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