Onward to Festival -- Save the Dates

I've received my contract for teaching at the International Quilt Festival in Houston in October, 2012. It's an honor to be among the 100 quilt/art/mixed media instructors selected to teach this year -- I've been off the roster for two years, and just squeeked in with my application this year!

So if you are planning to attend and want to take one of my workshops, here are the relevant dates:

Wednesday, October 31, full day workshop, Shaping Symbols into Art Quilts

"Master design skills with free-form patterns, cut-paper shapes, and original stamps as you explore personal imagery and iconic symbols. Simplify photos for original quilts, printing and more. Thermofax screen mailed later."   

I'll tell you more about this as the time approaches, but the picture above provides a bit of info, too. 

Sunday, November 4, Inspiration is in the Cards, half day workshop 9-noon.

"What inspires you? Create a one-of-a-kind card deck to spark creativity, take you out of your creative rut, move you into art-making and imagination. Collage and design your way to a new studio ritual with a variety of mixed media techniques."

This one is part of my annual agenda in the January Artist's Journey workshop (usually), but its a fun way to make a mixed media deck using collage, paint, paper and an inkjet copier.

In between, I'm on the circuit of the Mixed Media Miscellany, 2-4 on Thursday, the Friday Sampler, 10-noon and Saturday Sampler, 10-noon, with stamping and inkjet transfer demos.

Hope to see you there! And if you know someone who is planning on attending and taking classes this year, please reccommend these if you think they would suit. I'm looking forward to the wild, wacky, inspiring, overwhelming experience of festival, and I think everyone in our community of textile artists deserves the experience at least once in a lifetime. It's our tribe.

Two Weekends for Play and Passion

Not to mention: pears, peaches, pool (cool), plenty, and well, just lots of fun.

Coming up: July's Play Art and Attention and August's El Cielo Workshop will be hot-as-lava, fired-up with spirit and full of heat-based artcloth techniques that take advantage of the weather, the countryside and the grand vistas to inspire a new perspective on life, the artist's path and your place on the road.

First, we'll put play to the work of imagination and inspiration, with a variety of surface design techniques and creative exercises that open up possibilities for all kinds of new mixed media on paper and fabric. AND, we'll take a mid-year look at your annual art goals, how to reinvigorate your artistic studio focus, and set up some targets to hit with intention. Play and focus come together with a bit of yoga, some time in nature, and your hands in a zappy happy mix of new and fun materials.

In August, spend a couple of days exploring heat related techniques: textile paint sun-printing, rusting (afterall, a slow oxidation -- or burning -- process) and kitchen utensil and vegetable printing. We'll put your new fabrics together in a small art quilt art  Kitchen Altar, using a wooden frame and stitched work. Enjoy an August retreat from city's heat -- sure South Texas and the Hill Country are hot even up here in on the ridge, but it's always 10 degrees cooler at night than in the asphalt-ribboned city (and there's the pool, too). 

We'll be taking advantage of the  heat, with dye processes, using batik on fabric and to create screen-printing and more. Use the heat of the season to ignite your creative imagination, enjoy a convivial time with other artists and feast on the bounty of the season (some of it from El Cielo's own new veggie garden). 

If you're interested in making artcloth like the ones you see here

PLAY, ART AND ATTENTION

July 29-31

Making time to play with odd-ball materials; learning to focus upon artful tasks at hand -- sounds like opposite sides of the coin? At this exploratory and full-of-play weekend, we’ll explore the relationship between the time, play, art and focus. Where does time management intersect with open-hearted fun? Expect bubbles, playdough, sparklers, jello, yoga and seeing the world from new angles and attitudes. 

BURNING WOMAN WORKSHOP

August 19-21

Embrace your inner goddess of summertime. Design and make a small art quilt “altar” for kitchen or dining room with tools and materials that depend on heat, sunlight and passionate delight: sun-printing, vegetable prints, fusing, hand and machine stitching and “found” fabrics from attic, thrift store or kitchen closet. We will recycle napkins, tea towels and other like objects and design a thermofax featuring a meaningful symbol, favorite fruit, icon, saint, culinary heroine, angel or other meaningful design as the centerpiece for the altar. 

For more information, email me with the contact form on the sidebar. 

From Photo to Fabric

Time is running out to register for the next Photo to Fabric workshop at the Southwest School of Art:

The workshop is Saturday and Sunday, June 18-19 from 10 am to 4 pm. We'll be working both with digital media and with photos as a design inspiration for paint, stamps, color palettes and composition.

Class Sessions: 2

Maximum: 10

Location: Surface Design Studio | Navarro

Take your favorite photos and use them in original fabric art - both directly printed on your own fabric and as inspiration for a fabric collage to stitch later. Bring an assortment of photos, print or digital (on disk or flash drive) to the first class in order to select those that work best with each technique. You'll learn to make two different kinds of photo prints on fabric using an inkjet printer, and also enlarge, simplify and transfer a photograph to a larger wall fabric art quilt format, for later quilting or stitch work at home. Please see SSA website for a materials list. Bring a lunch each day.

Spring and Summer Workshops at El Cielo Studios

Here is a link to a downloadable pdf brochure with the dates and topics for new workshops at El Cielo Studios.

files.me.com/susiemonday/rvq162

  It's my pleasure to share my home and studio and a nurturing environment for your creative journey -- and the  workshop is less than what you'd spend for a bed-and-breakfast weekend alone! I hope to see you sometime this spring or summer for a weekend of inspiring and creative work and play here in the beautiful Texas Hill Country.

Nurture your creativity as you come away from a weekend with renewed energy, new  materials and techniques in surface design applicable to fiber, ceramics, jewelry, painting and mixed media work. Susie Monday leads artists’ retreats and workshops throughout the year at her studio near Pipe Creek, Texas, about an hour from downtown San Antonio. 

El Cielo Studio workshops are designed with the needs of the participants in mind;  free time is scheduled throughout the weekend for reading, reflection and personal work in the studio. You are welcome to bring projects in process for Susie’s critique and for peer feedback in an environment of trust and respect. You’ll share meals, poetry and stories, music and advice for living an artist’s life. Enjoy the 25-mile vistas from the deck and strolls down the country roads. A spa and pool, and large screen media room are also available to participants. The fee for each workshop retreat is $175 for a 2-day event with discount for early enrollment. Comfortable accommodations (double and single rooms with baths and shared bath rooms) and meals are available from $15 - $30 per workshop. Most supplies included. Call 210-643-2128 or econtact me through the email form on the sidebar of this blog.

Sign up early (at least 30 days in advance with a $25 deposit) for a $15 ndiscount on the $175 fee. Workshops generally start with an optional Friday night potluck and fun activity or two, then continue through 3-4 pm on Sunday afternoon. Most supplies included.

MARKMAKING, MAKING YOUR MARK

May 13-15

Markmaking can be what distinguishes one person's work on paper or fabric from another's - their personal style. Using color, line, shape, rhythm and textures, students will explore traditional and new media as well as techniques for personal markmaking. Techniques to be covered include deconstructed screenprinting, stamping, using paint sticks and monoprinting with gelatin plates. No matter what your experience level, you'll gain confidence in working with layered media and find your strongest media for the marks that make your work unmistakably your own. 

UFO WORKSHOP

June 3-5

UFO, “unfinished fiber object.” Bring along work that needs finishing, needs one more layer, needs some concentrated time and attention (or work that’s stuck for need of constructive critique). Enjoy the resources of the studio and the advice and support of peers. We’ll customize the techniques to the tasks at hand.

PLAY, ART AND ATTENTION

July 29-31

Making time to play with odd-ball materials; learning to focus upon artful tasks at hand -- sounds like opposite sides of the coin? At this exploratory and full-of-play weekend, we’ll explore the relationship between the time, play, art and focus. Where does time management intersect with open-hearted fun? Expect bubbles, playdough, sparklers, jello, yoga and seeing the world from new angles and attitudes. 

BURNING WOMAN WORKSHOP

August 19-21

Embrace your inner goddess of summertime. Design and make a small art quilt “altar” for kitchen or dining room with tools and materials that depend on heat, sunlight and passionate delight: sun-printing, vegetable prints, fusing, hand and machine stitching and “found” fabrics from attic, thrift store or kitchen closet. We will recycle napkins, tea towels and other like objects and design a thermofax featuring a meaningful symbol, favorite fruit, icon, saint, culinary heroine, angel or other meaningful design as the centerpiece for the altar. (This workshop has an additional $12 fee per person for the altar boxes that the quilts are stretched upon.)

OTHER CLASSES 

This spring and summer I also will be teaching occasionally at the Southwest School of Art: June 18-19 - From Photo to Fiber (using various techniques to design art quilts from photographs), August 1-5, mornings, New World Kids: for parents wishing to nurture creativity in their children.

I am also teaching a course for teachers: Fiber Arts for the Classroom at Southwest School of Art on July 23-24 (The wrong date is in the SSA catalog, I had to change the date after it was printed.)

 OTHER POSSIBILITIES:

Flying or driving in from afar for one of these weekends? Or just want some solo supported work time in the studio? Add one or two days of instruction in the studio for learning techniques that you are interested in. Each custom designed workshop and night’s lodging and meals costs $225 per person. Limit, 2 artists per session Many of Susie’s workshops go on the road! Please write for available dates and fees.

WHAT PARTICIPANTS SAY: 

“A workshop at Susie’s is always money well spent.  I learned techniques I have read about but never tried ... I also now feel confident that I can make art quilts!”

“This workshop was a fabulous, uplifting, nurturing environment to create in. The journaling was particularly helpful, I would definitely recommend it to a friend.”

“This weekend was totally awesome! I am humbled by Susie’s talents, her teaching abilities and her hospitality. I will come back as often as possible.”