First, a few thoughts about the installation.
The muslin will be pieced in a clamshell pattern (like this one). The pattern will be at a larger-than-life scale (that is, double or triple the size it would be for a functional quilt). I chose the clamshell pattern because it is difficult and rarely found in pieced quilts. It also has an interesting reference to clouds and/or sky.
Instead of quilting the text as I had originally planned, I am thinking of handwriting it with indelible ink on a small section of the muslin (probably on a piece near the floor). This decision came about from an experiment I did last night where I hand wrote a part of the text on muslin and quilted a few words. It took a long time to quilt and was very tedious, and didn't even look that good when I had finished.
I also did another lighting experiment this week:
The muslin will be pieced in a clamshell pattern (like this one). The pattern will be at a larger-than-life scale (that is, double or triple the size it would be for a functional quilt). I chose the clamshell pattern because it is difficult and rarely found in pieced quilts. It also has an interesting reference to clouds and/or sky.
Instead of quilting the text as I had originally planned, I am thinking of handwriting it with indelible ink on a small section of the muslin (probably on a piece near the floor). This decision came about from an experiment I did last night where I hand wrote a part of the text on muslin and quilted a few words. It took a long time to quilt and was very tedious, and didn't even look that good when I had finished.
I also did another lighting experiment this week:
I used two layers of the same muslin I plan to use in the final installation. They did not have batting between them this time (although I tried it at one point and it had almost no effect on the quality or brightness of light that came through the muslin). I tried two things:
~Hanging a strand of Christmas lights about six inches behind the muslin (about six inches away from it), and
~Hanging a single bare bulb in the back of the room (around three to four feet away from the muslin).
I liked how the Christmas lights looked - there were definite points of light, but it was easier to get the kind of gradation from bright to dark by manipulating the fabric's distance from the source. For the installation I'm planning to use a net of Christmas lights, hung about six inches above the muslin.
Sources
Mary Schafer, American Quilt Maker
Gwen Marston
University of Michigan Press: 2004
p. 62-63
