Fading Footprints Quilt
 

I haven't posted in a while but I thought I would share my latest project. I started my Fading Footprints quilt earlier this year and just finished in December. I can’t sit inside during the summer months at my sewing machine so I took a long break off. Last year, when I was finishing another art quilt project, I thought my next quilt should be endangered animals.


I initially debated a while about how to do them. I knew I want finished 10x10” blocks that surrounded a large center panel with some borders. I eventually decided to sketch/paint the animals on the fabric.


My process was the same for all 19 animals. I would lightly sketch the animal with minimal detail then I painted them. I used Tsukineko all-purpose inks and since I was doing this on fabric I had a lot of bleeding and wicking of the ink so I had to really take that into account when painting. They also worked better if the fabric was wet otherwise it would just soak right in and not blend. I also had to let each layer dry before going onto the next but I got them done fairly quickly. I could do two animals a day except for the center. That took me a full 2 days to complete.

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After I painted them, they looked okay but still kinda flat. So I decided to thread paint them with embroidery thread to help the animal stand out a bit. I didn’t do much in the backgrounds on most of them because I wanted people to look at the animal and focus on them. Some animals are not thread painted at all. That’s mostly because I didn’t want to mess up my painting. Basically, I did thread painting where I thought it needed it the most.


I was also terrified to work on the center rhino but it looked too flat. So I eventually, took a deep breath and started working with dark colors first working my way up to the lightest. Again, I just focused on the animal, specifically the face, since that’s where most people look.


I imagined the rhino would have tall gasses in front him and a tree going up the side and across the top of the animal. So I took some fabric and batting and started to draw some tall grass shapes with a frixon pen. I then quilted all the grasses and painted them with my Ink tense pencils. I did the same with the tree and limbs but I used my inks. I also painted more fabric for the leaves using some oil paint sticks, and used that fabric for some embroidered appliqué leaves.

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After I got the animals painted, I decided I would go ahead and paint the sashing that was going to go between the pictures. Since all the animal backgrounds are different colors but primarily blue, green, brown and a few grays, I decided the sashing could be those same colors and kind blend into the other colors. I didn’t want to try to find different fabrics that fit the bill so I thought, “I’ll just paint the sashing.” So I got the inks back out and painted the sashing.


Next, up was the borders. I thought I’d have different footprints of animals in the borders that would go from dark (more prominent) to light (less prominent) in the hopes of mimicking footprints that are fading. I wound up painting the fabric and drawing the footprints since that just seemed like the easy way at this point.


And while I was painting that fabric, I figured I’d just go ahead and paint enough fabric for the binding in various shades of blue.


I also decided to try some fusible batting between the backing and top. I was hoping to keep my backing fabric straight on the back since I always seem to get a big wrinkle and I only see it after I’ve sewn it all together. I used Hobbs fusible batting and it worked like a charm. I really liked that it wasn’t a hard fuse. I could reposition the top/back if necessary and smooth things out. It held everything in place while I did some stitch in the ditch around the sashing and not a pin in sight.


After I put the binding on, I used a fusible tape to hold the binding to the back. It took a while to fuse that clear around the quilt but it held perfectly and again no pins. Win win in my book.
I made my quilt label next. Since this is an art quilt, its a little bigger than most. In addition to my personal info and quilt title, I wanted to let people know some stats about the black rhino (center panel) and a quote about conservation from David Attenborough seemed appropriate, as well as a list of all the animals I featured. I even had enough sashing left over to put around the quilt label. The quilt measures 68x78.

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Zounds! You have IT girl.

Wow! What a unique and creative piece! You are very talented!! Thanks for sharing the details of this. Lots of work, but well worth your efforts!! :):)

OMG - Fabulous! I hope that you enter it in some sort of quilt show and get the recognition that you deserve!

Well Done!

Thank you, Lisa, for sharing the details of your artistic creativity. So often, we only see the finished product so it was inspiring to see the details, as well! Wish I lived near enough to see this magnificent piece of art in person.

Oh my Lisa!! You are truly talented. Your sketching and painting are gorgeous and then throw in the thread painting..... A work of art!! FABULOUS! I give it my vote for quilter's choice award.

There are not enough words of admiration in the dictionary, for your efforts and the results. Absolutely amazing! Please enter this in a show because it needs to be seen by as many people as possible.

SPECTACULAR!!! Thank you for including details of how you did everything.

You have created a masterpiece. I love the different foot prints.

Stunning beyond words!

What a phenomenal achievement! It is just gorgeous. I admire your talent and creativity. Well done!

You have TONS of talent Lisa. What an excellent quilt to be made of the animals that footprints ARE disappearing from this earth. I HOPE this quilt can make a difference.

Spectacular.

Wiping the drool off my keyboard. Stunning.

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's TOTALLY AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Absolutely gorgeous and so unique. Your drawing/painting and quilting are fabulous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gasp! This should be in Houston or a major art show and/or museum!! It would be amazing on canvas, but even more so on fabric!!

Beautiful - and thank you for creating such a compassionate work of art.

What an astonishing creation! It's lovely and touching, as well. You are quite the artist. If only one person's awareness of these issues is awakened, you will have achieved your goal.

What a stunning piece you have created! Wonderful.....

WOW!!! What a fabulous piece of art! Lisa - is your quilt ever displayed locally? I'd love to see it in person and I'm in Gahanna, Ohio.

wow, I have no words, simply stunning, excellent work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Unbelievable, the colors and acuity of the colors. Love the black footed ferret the best. he's adorable.
Just museum quality work here. Your quilting added so much dimension to it.

What a work of art, just stunning!

wow its should be entered in a aquilt show

What a beautiful work of art.

I just finished the quilt last week so its not displayed anywhere but I'm thinking about entering it in the state fair in 2016. I've never entered a quilt in a show before.

Wow. You are a true artist. Well done.

If you do enter it somewhere let us know.

Stunning! Both your painting and quilting are wonderful.

Do you have any sources for learning how to use the inks. Did you use a thickener with the inks or just use it with the gel?

very talented, so very pretty, sure looks like a lot of work but it sure was worth all of it.. just beautiful!

Ditto! you are very creative.

WOW!!! What a wonderful work of art.......exceptional!!!

Amazing work...you are dual talented...you are a sketch artist in addition to a fine quilter. One of the reasons I think I do not do well at FMQ is because I have no artistic talent. I am very creative but not artistic at all. I will stick with the fabric...LOL...again...this is a beautiful work of art and with a great purpose I might add.

Dolphyngyrl - The inks are 15ml pots - so they are super small but they seemed to go along way especially using water. No thickener used. I wanted to keep the material soft and not have it dry hard and the inks did a good job with that. They're more transparent however, the white was more opaque and dried a lot harder which I figured out along the way and I tried to avoid it after painting the polar bear. http://www.dharmatrading.com/paints/...rpose-ink.html

Amazing and wonderful!

what a beautiful work of art! You have so many talents and I can only imagine how much time you have in this quilt, clearly a labor of LOVE. Thank you for taking the time to post and share... it is an amazing piece.

This is gorgeous. You are very talented

absolutely awesome!

Absolutely beautiful - certainly worthy of a ribbon.