Heard Mentality: a Tabletop Quilt

I have bags of small-sized scraps of batting, and no more large pieces, so I am making what I call "tabletop" quilts. Quiltlets, really. I also have a big bag of fabric scraps, so we have a match! The scale is perfect. I'm enjoying playing with the shapes and colors, like working a puzzle. And every fabric scrap has a story: all together, a story of my projects and a biography, of sorts. I'm still energized by the quilts of Rosie Lee Tompkins and feel like I'm learning from her, particularly about taking color risks. I tend to match colors, but she threw in bright contrasting colors, and it usually worked to draw your eye right in and around. This new small one is 18"w x 27.25"h (46 cm x 69 cm).


In this detail: a solar-printed grandcat that I didn't use in a quilt, a fish print that covered my kitchen window once, various hand-dyed fabrics used in other quilts and some "pockets" for a friend, Guatemalan cloth that was once a couch cover, leftover cloth from a dress made by someone else.


The words, "I Heard" were what prompted the title; I had printed the wood type in yellow for a different project. "Herd mentality" is a term that describes how people can be influenced by their peers based on emotions of the group, rather than facts or rational thought. "We will not" is in the upper left, formerly printed for my Undersea Colonies quilt. It's a caution. We have to be careful right now as the pandemic situation changes daily to make sure we are making the right choices and listening to expert sources. And not be swayed by groupthink. I listen to the radio as I keep on sewing.


I received a fat quarter of the purple and black swash from Bay Quilts free with a recent order.
The edge of the cloth said it was called "Hockney's Pools," and research yielded an Architectural Digest article, and yes, the bottom of the artist David Hockney's actual swimming pool has swashes like that.



Stay Safe. Be Well. Mind the gap.

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