Claire Sherman Art

Orange Is the New Purple II

Posted on December 11, 2015 by admin

C & J Wedding Quilt 2015

This is a quilt I made last spring as a wedding present for friends. These are some of their favorite colors. I had to buy a lot of new fabric for this quilt, because, I rarely used orange before making it. Then, the back of this quilt inspired another quilt, which I named Orange Is the New Purple, because usually my quilts have a lot of purple in them.

Here is Orange Is the New Purple:

Orange Is the New Purple 2015

Now, I’m working on a new quilt, using the same technique as the wedding quilt. I’m calling the quilt “Orange Is the New Purple II. I’m calling the technique, “improvisational stained glass”. I’m hoping to teach this as a class soon. However, I need a quilt to demonstrate the technique. Since I gave away the first one, I need to make another. I’m almost done quilting it with a walking foot.

Posted in Improvisational piecing, improvisational stained glass, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Quilts in the Addison Street Windows!

Posted on December 8, 2015 by admin

If you happen to be in downtown Berkeley, any time between now and January 15th, I have a quilt in the mini quilt show in the Addison Street Windows. This is on the same block with Berkeley Rep and Freight & Salvage, on Addison between Shattuck and Milvia, on the south side of the street. One of my quilts is in there, but it’s hard to see because there are so many quilts inside. Below is an unobstructed view of my quilt.

Joseph’s Stars 2014

I made this quilt for Amish: The Modern Muse, a show at the SJ Museum of Quilts and Textiles. I designed it by making five liberated stars in three sizes. I put them up on my design wall, with black fabric behind them. Then I arranged them, and rearranged them until I liked the layout. I sewed them together using large chunks of black fabric to connect them to each other. When I was done, I decided it worked better upside down.

The use of two different shades of black fabric in this quilt is a quintessentially Amish touch. When I ran out of one black fabric, I substituted another, just as the Amish would have done. I like how it makes a subtle window frame around the stars. For those unfamiliar with Amish quilts, they are known for their use of black and vibrant solid colored fabric. Amish quilters don’t use patterned fabric because it is considered too frivolous or worldly.

Posted in Improvisational piecing, liberated stars, Quilt Shows, Uncategorized | Tagged East Bay Heritage Quilters | 2 Comments

Quilt Therapy

Posted on December 4, 2015 by admin

Elisheva’s Dragons 2012

Since I blogged about my younger daughter’s quilt, it seemed only fair that I blog about the quilt I made for Elisheva, my older one. I made it during the summer, after her high school graduation, and finished it before she left for college. Instead of worrying about her going off to college, I worried about whether or not I was going to get her quilt finished in time. It was great therapy for me. I didn’t start it earlier because I was waiting for her to draw me the dragons for the center. Her dragons are vastly superior to mine. She also chose the colors. I’m very happy with how it turned out. The “liberated stars” are from Gwen Marston’s book, Liberated Quiltmaking II.

Posted in liberated stars, Uncategorized | Tagged Gwen Marston | 5 Comments

12 x 12

Posted on December 3, 2015 by admin

I’m in a group that we call 12 x 12. Twelve of us meet once a month, and make a 12″ x 12″ quilt or any other art that is that size. In the group are people doing mosaics, drawing, mixed media, and lots of quilters. At the end of the year we’ll have a show of everyone’s twelve pieces. In the Quilt Gallery 2015, above, there are two previous 12 x 12’s. Although I’ve already finished one for this month, (see above) I’m working on a second, because I lent last month’s to SAQA. SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) http://www.saqa.com is an art quilt organization that I just joined. They have a traveling trunk show of member’s work from the N CA/ NV region that will travel for the next year. Therefore I won’t get the quilt back for our 12 x 12 show. Coincidentally, the size for the SAQA show was also 12″ x 12″, which was great, since I had no time to make anything new.

Posted in 12 x 12, Improvisational piecing | Tagged SAQA | Comments Off

Good Enough to Eat

Posted on December 2, 2015 by admin

This is the quilt I made for my daughter, Shira, in 2012, from the food themed fabrics. It’s called Good Enough To Eat. The photo was taken at the Voices In Cloth Quilt Show. I made it as part of the “virtual round robin” from my online quilt group, the Lib-Quilters. If you click on the Publications tab above, you can read what I wrote about this group and the virtual round robin.

Good Enough to Eat 2012
(twin bed size)

Posted in Improvisational piecing, Uncategorized | Comments Off

Welcome to Claire Sherman Art

Posted on December 1, 2015 by admin

Baskets and Hot Lemonade 2014

Baskets and Hot Lemonade is 31” x 29 ½”

For my first blog post, I chose a quilt I finished in 2014, called Baskets and Hot Lemonade. My younger daughter, Shira, has frequently encouraged me to buy food themed fabrics. I thought I was buying them for her. However, since she didn’t make anything out of them, I made a quilt with the food themed fabric for her bed. I’ll blog about that quilt some other time. Meanwhile, I still had lots of fabric left, so I experimented with food themed baskets. I made these basket blocks as samples of different ways to make handles for a “liberated basket” demo for the East Bay Heritage Quilters, Thursday night meet-up group. There is a pieced handle, a fused, and satin stitched handle, and handles made from bias-cut fabric, appliquéd by machine.

Although I’m calling them baskets, the lemon fabric turned into a cup of lemonade. (Hot lemonade with honey is our family remedy for a sore throat). Carrying on with the food theme, the vine at the bottom is sprouting cupcakes rather than flowers or berries. I appliquéd the leaves and cupcakes with fusible-web, and zigzagged the edges with monofilament. I did the quilting with a walking foot.

I learned how to make these “liberated baskets” from Gwen Marston’s book, Liberated Quiltmaking II. Of all the quilters I’ve learned from, over the years, Gwen has had the biggest influence on me. Therefore it’s fitting that I mention her and one of her wonderful books in my first blog post.

Posted in Liberated basket, Uncategorized | Tagged East Bay Heritage Quilters, Gwen Marston, liberated basket | Comments Off