World of Threads: three solo shows 2023

The Seventh Jacket by Victoria Carley
upholstery and fashion fabrics, embroidery floss

This post highlights the work of three artists who have solo exhibitions at this year's world of threads.  

The first artist  is Victoria Carley from Toronto, Canada.  Carley is showing three of her new Fairy Tale series.  You can view more of this body of work on her website.    All these quilt-like artworks are large wall pieces, similar in size to a child's 'big kid' bed.  (often called a twin bed)

The Beanstalk by Victoria Carley
upholstery and fashion fabrics, embroidery floss

"My illustrations of fairy tales are personal meditations on the stories.  I compare my recollections to other literary and visual retellings of the fairy tale.  Every version is a reflection of its era, artistically and morally."  Victoria Carley

Hansel and Gretel by Victoria Carley
upholstery and fashion fabrics, embroidery floss

"With the image the story presents to me in mind I start.  I select, cut and sew my fabrics, without preliminary drawings.  The final composition and the size develop as I sew.  My process is slow and intuitive.  I use a wide variety of fabrics.  My sewing machine is a vintage international and I hand-embroider to complete the image. "  Victoria Carley

Hansel and Gretel, detail of the witch's house by Victoria Carley

The second artist in this post is Roxanna Kantarjian, also from Toronto, Canada.  Her solo show highlights her Mysterious Veils series.  Kantarjian uses solid colours of cotton in bold original shapes, sewn together and then densely quilted using a sewing machine.  Each piece is as big as a large painting - about 45 x 35 inches in most cases.  

Mysterious Veil I by Roxanna Kantarjian, machine pieced and quilted cotton

"Energy and healing have always been the foundation of my life - especially evident in my artwork.  I am acutely aware of the energy around me in nature - trees, stones, water, and mountains.  There is a specific vibration in every colour. How the colours live together side by side presents a different vibration.  I try to express this energy with colours and shapes."   Roxanna Kantarjian  

Mysterious Veil III, cotton that is machine pieced and quilted

"The Mysterious Veils were an exploration of that fine line between life and death. This series was prompted by my husband's death.  To explore, it was soothing and healing."  Roxanna Kantarjian  

Stones by Roxanna Kantarjian, machine pieced and quilted cotton

The third artist in this post is Karen Thiessen from Hamilton, Canada.   Thiessen's Hope Series of hand stitched wall pieces is highlighted in the World of Threads solo exhibition.   Most pieces are large wall pieces, although Lull is large enough to cover two people.    To visit her website, click here. 

Lull by Karen Thiessen  Cotton fabrics,
hand pieced using the English paper method and then hand quilted.

 

"The Hope Series explores post-traumatic growth - the gifts of difficult circumstances."  Karen Thiessen

In a Dark Time the Eye Begins to See (for Theodore Roethke) by Karen Thiessen. 
Dyed cotton, hand and machine stitched, with applique.

"Some people are able to emerge from difficult times with greater resilience and more compassion, wisdom and awareness."  Karen Thiessen

Circles of Hope by Karen Thiessen 
 Dyed cotton and rayon, hand and machine stitched, with applique

"Difficulties disrupt our lives and can create openings and pauses for new ways of thinking and living."  K.T.

Constellation of Hope by Karen Thiessen 
Dyed cotton and cotton/polyester fabrics that have been stitched with hand and machine 

"The pandemic forced me to use materials that I had on hand and the Hope quilts were made from failed or abandoned textiles.  Over three years, I slowly stitched them during incessant pandemic lockdowns: I rescued and transformed the textiles while they rescued and transformed me."   Karen Thiessen

Beyond the Curtain by Karen Thiessen. 
Hand embroidered cotton fabric mounted on felt

Beyond the Curtain by Karen Thiessen, detail of hand stitch

The Seventh Jacket by Victoria Carley, detail of machine piecing

The World of Threads has more than fifty solo shows this year.  They are around every corner and in several open room type spaces that one can find in the Queen Elizabeth Park and Community Cultural Centre building, 2302 Bridge Road, Oakville, Ontario.  Plan to spend two days visiting this festival, you will feel rewarded and renewed.  I hope to post about more solo shows over the next few weeks.  xo

UPDATE: NOVEMBER 1:  the venue for World of Threads Festival will close to the public on November 2 until further notice as the staff that run the building work for the city of Oakville, and they will be on strike.  I will keep this notice updated and will let you know when the building will be open again.  The exhibitions of World of Threads are set to continue until December 17, so we hope that the strike is resolved soon.  

Do you think the world has enough quilts yet?

the rescued Dresden plates from my earliest quilt,
re-appliqued onto new plant dyed linen, silk, rayon, wool

The title of this post is from my journal.

I wrote it a few days ago at 2:30 am when I was in the middle of un-stoppable creativity. 

 

You Are a Single Star

the round and round one-patch quilt that uses up my remnants of dyed damask 

I've been allowing myself to make and make without a plan or purpose, just a deep need to create.

What I make with my hands is related to the rhythm and finality of a human time span.

Your Fragile Life

I usually finish the quilts I make, but sometimes I don't.

Sometimes I come across false starts and don't understand them.

Other times I come across things I've started and become excited and need to work on them again.

 

on the wall left to right:  Suvi's baby quilt, White Cross, A Sky Full, and untitled, 
the folded green quilt was made by April, on the railing is Canadian Pioneer,   
left side of sofa is a wool grid backed with red silk,
right side of sofa is New Beginning, my pandemic patchwork

Creativity is a human activity. 

hand stitched cotton

I live my life.

I make quilts.

inspired by cloth and play and by that pink doily quilt I made a few years ago 

I know myself by making my quilts. 

Labour Day weekend

My quilts make my personal daily experiences meaningful.  

Marimekko cloth I have been hoarding

American sculptor, Anne Truitt, said that her work helped her to see her own life as something between natural and abstract.  

A Sky Full

"As I live, certain aspects of what is happening adhere to me as if magnetized by psychic gravity.  I have learned to trust this center"  Anne Truitt

The Countdown Quilt

"The process of art contains my intensities but also exorcizes those beyond my endurance"  A.T.

The Countdown Quilt with one layer of gauze upon which I've gone over with ink the weekly journal notes that I wrote on the back of the foundation blocks. 
One log cabin block each week, this quilt contains 49 weeks.  
I started it on our 46th wedding anniversary.  I appreciated every week that we both kept our health. 
 I was counting down towards the 50th, which happened this year.

"I depend on objectification for defense." Anne Truitt  

The weather this month was unreal.  

It poured light and imagination every day. 

my life work

counting my blessings 1999

about my children

cry me a river 2001

about my mother

hold me 1993

about my husband

thunder and lightning 1989

about my  work

order belies chaos 1990

about my marriage

fragile as a leaf in autumn 2004

about my husband and about the earth

between the leading note and the tonic 1998

about teaching

something more magical than it ever was 1991

about memory

Gaea Enthroned 1992

about spirituality and mother earth



My roots are in the grand narrative of traditional quilt pattern and symbolic language.
My subject is our relationships to each other and to the earth.

These quilts were made when the kids were still at home, minutes here and there over months and years, I needed to get them out of me and into the world.

They are on my  mind today because a new website,is under construction and decisions have to be made about content.  These pieces will be in a folder entitled Story Quilts.

mysterious

whirling

gentle

felt in the body

in the middle of my story

I am an artist.

I live on a large island in Lake Huron.

I have lived here for 26 years with my husband.

Before that, I lived in North Western Ontario for 40 years.

My cities were Winnipeg and Thunder Bay, half day car drives away. 

I dream all the time.

I have made art my whole life.  

While raising my family of four kids, I taught classical piano and continued my art.

I constantly study art.

I obtained two fine art honours BA degrees through distance education. 

 In December 2018 I received the Craft Ontario award for mid-career excellence.

The name of the award (mid-career ) is inspiring.

Does that mean that although I am in my mid-60’s and have pursued art my whole life that I am merely in the middle of my artistic career?   Yay.

Mid-Career - those words make me want to go closer to the edge. 

Those words make me want to go deeper into myself.

I want to go somewhere on my art path that I have not been before, and that I do not know.

I want to be brave in this journey.   I want to take more risks.

Quilt National 17 (the Nancy Crow legacy)

....and the Skeptic by Karen Schulz   81 " x 76"
cotton fabric, cotton batting, thread, yarn
hand dyed, machine pieced, machine quilted, couched

 

"I found myself asking the question, "What are you afraid of?"  The answer came back, "Look at what people have done.  You can do anything."  I decided then and there to embrace the whole of myself, the poet and the skeptic."  Karen Schulz Maryland USA  (Juror's award)

Nightshift by Kit Vincent 79 x 79 "
cotton, silk, dyed and commercial cottons, thread, batting
machine pieced and quilted, appliqued

 

 "I began without expectation, allowing the design to surface as I worked.  My goal was to challenge the perception of the material and to create an emotional repsonse with the viewer."  Kit Vincent  Ontario Canada

Chasms 23 by beth Carney  54 x 67 inches
hand dyed cotton fabtic, silk batting, madeira threads
raw edged fusing, machine pieced and quilted

 

" The bright colours traveling through the sometimes black, sometimes murky-grey, become a symbol of who we are as we move through experiences in life that continually challenge us.  Beth Carney  New York  USA

Zebra by Bonnie Bucknam  51 x 51 inches

hand dyed cotton fabric

machine pieced and quilted

 

"While touring South Africa, I had the pleasure of seeing a zebra in the wild." Bonnie Bucknam Washington USA

Conversations on Meaning  by Gerri Spilka  82 x 100 inches
commercial and hand dyed cottons, cotton and wool batting, cotton thread
improvisationally machine pieced and quilted (denoted by the artist
machine quilted by Marina Baudoin

 

"Interactions series reflects a fascination with themes that reappear.  The interactions, relationships, and ambiguities inherent among people, place, and human-made and biolgical forces."  Gerri Spilka  Pennsylvania USA  Juror's award

Formations #26 by Petra Fallaux  83 x 85 inches
hand dyed pima cottons, procion mx dyes
freely cut fabric, machine pieced and quilted

 

"Having grown up in the Netherlands, I find that I am most attracted to spare geometric forms.  Formation 26 evokes the vast horizon and moody morning skies over coastal Holland"  Petra Fallaux Pennsylvania USA

 Petra Fallaux was one of the jurors for this 20th biennial of Quilt National and says this about the exhibition as a whole:

"The driving motor behind the first Quilt National at the Dairy Barn in 1979 was to provide an exhibit opportunity to artists whose work was unwelcome by the organizers of the existing quilt shows.  This original impetus has resulted in a rich, tangible, and continuous biennial history of throught-provoking Quilt nationals.  Today, Quilt National is an art exhibition among many others of its kind, but it will forever be the first of its kind."  Petra Fallaux

Nancy Crow, one of Quilt National Founders has ben making quilts for 40 years
standing in front of the quilt that was awarded best of show 

"Wow!  What a rich variety of works greet viewers of quilt National 17.  As a juror, I was thrilled to see so many strong quilts entered by artists whose work I did not know and additionally thrilled by the astounding new growth shown by seasoned artists known for their singular earlier styles.  In all categories, I found that the best works exhibited dramatically strong ideas combined with dedicated techniques that were skillfully executed."  Nancy Crow   Ohio  USA

Line Study 17 by Margaret Black    90 x 75 inches
Kona cotton, thread, wool bat, cotton batting
free form cutting and piecing, machine quilted
Best of Show award