Fractured Landscape

Finally, my Fractured Landscape piece is finished! I may have spent more time on this piece than any other but that doesn't make it my favourite. I have spent so much time on it that I just had to finish it or all the time spent would have seemed like such a waste.

Another driver for me to complete this piece was that quite some time ago I entered it into the Quilter's Guild competition which will be held at the Festival of Quilts in August. The theme for this year's competition is 'Passion in Pieces' and I have incorporated two of my passions into this piece; my passion for landscapes, which is in pieces (!) and also my passion for stitching which is represented by the text I have layered and layered and reads  'I cannot count my day complete till fabric thread and needle meet'.

I used the text as a way of creating colour and texture and a way of referencing another of my passions and I knew the words would never be legible but you can see some of the letters if you look closely. Although this was a very time consuming method of colouring cloth, there are parts of the fabric that I really like which I probably couldn't have created by any other (quicker) method.

This is also the first time I have left raw edges in a piece and this is something that I would normally shy away from but I think it did emphasise the landscape 'in pieces'. 

And of course I couldn't finish the piece without the addition of some hand stitching. There was more hand stitching on the work earlier in the week but some of it got lost when I cut 2 1/2 inches off the top. Drastic? Yes. Last minute? Yes! The deadline for delivery was yesterday, which I met - just.. And although it was a shame to lose the stitching, I feel the piece looks better for it. 

Lesson learnt from this piece: Pay more attention to proportions, just because a piece of fabric is a certain size, it doesn't mean you have to use it all.