quilts from the American Folk Art Museum

Here are some of my favourite quilts from the archive of the American Folk Art museum. Please understand that these are photos of photos of quilts . . . which I find a little dissatisfying, but I wanted to show you anyway because the patterns are so stonking.
I was lucky enough to see some of the quilts for real whilst I was in New York this year and they took my breath away. There's something about the colours and the textures and the size of them - as I was walking around it felt like there were some gnomes doing a conga around my intestines.
I splashed most of my holiday cash on buying this book, which is where all these pictures have come from. I've put my favourite quilt first - I love that the pattern is immediately very simple but actually intricately worked with beautiful leaf and floral shapes. If you've got a favourite do let me know.







































. . . I wonder whether I know any sausage clever enough to make me a beautiful orange quilt with a star in the middle . . .

In the house of the clever sausage.

Recently I was lucky enough to go see that clever sausage again, let's call him Brian for short. This time he let me take photos of his house and his projects. It was a real treat being shown all the magical things he and his partner (Richard the brainy salami) make.

Here he is poking around in Richard's workshop, looking for things to show me.

 Richard does a lot of weaving, I liked this basket that he made and that a robin nested in - seems a pretty good seal of approval.





You can soak strips of bark to make them pliable for weaving with.



 And so on up to Brian's workshop where he does all his weaving.

This is dried weld which he grows in the garden and uses to dye wool stonking shades of yellow that make you dribble.
 
dribble . . . dribble . . . groan . . . dribble.

Then it gets knitted into glorious jumpers and quilts.

Downstairs there's boxes of walnuts, also ready to be made into dyes.

Walnuts make different shades of brown (the black bits are from another dye).

What I really love about Brian's house is that everything is beautiful and functional. Nothing is contrived or silly. I like the way he ties the garlic . . .


I like the way he grows his vines in a criss-cross.

And I like that he uses this tool for weaving with. Look at how beautifully it's made.
Everywhere you look there's another still-life.

Even socks on the line look good at Brian's house.

White

A smattering of white this week.

Arty bits.

Last week I was at the opening of The Penis Show. You can look at pictures here.
Also showing some work was an artist called Olivia-jane Ransley who I thought was very good. She does a nice series called the Quotidian Entries which you sign up for by email, then you receive an image with a caption from time to time. They are very entertaining.
Browsing her website I was really tickled by this letter.
The reply she gets is also brilliant.

What a good egg.

Le weekend

I had a hectic weekend that left me with a sore stomach. I attribute my severe over-eating to the fact I went out wearing an old silk nightie and a big jumper. It's my favourite outfit at present - so loose fitting and so warm, the only downside is that it doesn't pinch you when you're full.
So . . . after a full english at my favourite greasy spoon we hopped down to the Garden Museum. Which is a splendid museum, based in an old church, it was opened after the discovery of the tombs of John Trandescant the elder and the younger on the site. They were plant hunters, gardeners and collectors of the seventeenth century, I'd like to be all those things.

First we had a look at the permanent collection. My favourite thing was this cloche. It's a funny thing to have a permanent collection in a museum dedicated to something as transient as gardens; as a result the display is pretty archaic. They have one of my favourite lumpy watering cans and Gertrude Jekyll's desk. They also have a wall of trowels and spades. What they really need is a mannequin with a bad wig, holding a watering can and wearing some wellies. Maybe I'll put them in touch with Lenny.
 
They also have a very fine garden, I liked the prints this aloe has left on itself.
 
And I decided to start small with my learning of plant names - Aster, or Aster Divaricatus, an example of a michelmas daisy . . . and very pretty.
Some more food, then we headed in to the current exhibition, which is really good, thought provoking and well curated. The perfect size to make you come out feeling nourished.
After that our walk along the Thames was very slow and ponderous. I couldn't believe the boats that were moored by the houses of parliament.
 
They're so scrabby, what are they for? What happens on them? Can I moor there? I really hate the houses of parliament mind, they're spikey and reek of a old fashioned feudal ideals, maybe mooring near them would just make me angry. (I think we should have a parliament like the new Reichstag extension, and I think it should be in Luton)
When you look closely at this one . . .
 
It's just got lots of chairs and kegs on it. What fun.
The tide was out and we walked along the foreshore, seeing the underside of the bridges is a nice thing.
 
Plenty of inspiration for some fabric designs.
, 


My favourite piece of graffiti to date . . .

I might go so far as calling it urban art.
We walked for ages and I ended up with a bag full of broken bits of pottery and bones. Some of the best things I had to leave - like this glove.

This message in a bottle . . . the message itself was missing, but still - how exciting.

 And this heavy thing with a good pattern.



I really like my camera and taking pictures but sometimes I feel like a right cock wizard - roaming around poking my lens in places, snapping everything. Then I saw this bloke taking close up pictures of old chain and I realised I must also look like a real cock wizard . . . so I took a picture.
 
Oh well. Here's the beginnings of my broken glass bottoms collection to cheer me up.