I equally appreciate the talent it takes to either hand or machine quilt. I realize everyone has different preferences, and since I was out of the 'quilt world' for so long, I am surprised that the very dense quilting created by machine quilting has become the 'norm'.
Personally, I've always thought of a quilt as a warm, comfy, comforting creation, but the dense quilting looks & feels 'hard' & cold to me, & meant for a museum or the 'art' world, & not for comforting someone.