Dinner at Eight Interview for Exquisite Moment

I have been accepted for the annual exhibition with Dinner At Eight Artists, the intrepid, Jamie and Leslie. blog here

The following is an interview which will appear on their blog.

1, What year did you make your first quilt?  Traditional or art?

I made my first quilt, self-taught & experimental with found scraps, in 1974.

Amethyst Summer

2.  What is the first show, and year, that you ever entered your art quilts?  Venue?

Quilt National has always been at the top of my list, Art Quilt 21, that is now Art Quilt Lowell, MA, Quilters Gathering, MA and my local guild. In 1986, one of my pieces was requested for the museum that became the National Quilt Museum in Paducah, KY.

Jonathan's Dream

3.  What is your artistic style?

I love to experiment. My work has grown though many stages. Presently, I work with digital fiber processes.

4.  Have you ever changed your style from when you started making quilts?

Yes, I have a lecture, Journey with a Fiber Artist, which shows my work as it changed and grew. Transformation is the lifeblood of my work.

5.  What other style in quilt making peaks your interest?

I’m really into digital works. I enjoy how other artists use the process to present images differently or use a consistent subject matter as their focus. Digital Collage is fast becoming my new focus.

6.  What other medium in art influences your work as a fiber artist?

Media Mix is my term for a workshop I offer using fibers, papers and a host of acrylic mediums. The spontaneity and serendipity feed the process of experimentation.

I will be teaching this at Peters Valley Crafts Center , NJ on August 23-27- Info Here

Whispers of the Positive 

7.  What do you have coming up?  Shows, Articles in magazines, Books, etc.

I’m proud to have been included in Brainstorms at Visions Art Museum, CA, recently, at Interplay: Digital Mixed Media at Cotuit Center, and upcoming, Sacred Threads, Pushing the Surface, Johnson-Humrickhouse Museum OH, Niche Award finalist and interview Lesley Riley’s radio www.blogtalkradio.com

Published Articles

SAQA Winter Journal

Quilting Arts Magazine, Textured Fiber Photographs

Interweave DVD Workshop, Textured Fiber Photographs-     Info Here

Leaping Point

Books

Cutting Edge Art Quilts, Mary Kerr

Fabric Surface Design, Cheryl Rezendes

Bound, a WCA NYC exhibit

Studio Quilt, Sandra Sider

8.  Where will your art take you from here?

Hopefully, into the flow, imagination and continued growth. One of my key phrases I use about my art is- ‘Making the Imagination Real’.  One of the joys of teaching is seeing workshop participants reveal themselves, get into the flow and make art.

9.  Describe your studio space:

Recently, I have moved out of a delightful studio space in an art community and also, out of a large studio in my home into a smaller but very efficient studio in a new home. There is lots of natural light. There is the simple joy of retraction, with the expectation of how this new environment will influence my work.

10. What was the biggest challenge you have encountered in the making of your art quilt for "An Exquisite Moment?"

I wanted to use lots of color for this piece. Normally, my work is muted in tone.

I worked with a number of images, which are collaged digitally.

The colors in the piece are created by the addition of images of my painted fabrics. These layer over the complete collage, influencing or changing the final color.

 

Birds Eye View detail- see full piece on Dinner at Eight's blog (link at top)

WEBSITE http://wenredmond.weebly.com/ 

BLOGs  http://fiberartgoddess.blogspot.com

Brimming

Featured on Running with Scissors 

interview here

Three Weird Sisters

excerpt

RWSS: Best advice you’ve ever received?  

WEN: Be yourself. Only you can do what you must do. Come from the very best place in yourself. Honor that. It takes so much energy to try to be like someone else.

RWSS: What do you enjoy most about your work?

WEN: Everything! I am a process person. I enjoy the inspiration, thinking up new ideas, the painting, photography, everything. I do it 24/7. The thing I’ve noticed is the more you practice something, the better you get. Being an artist, you develop and ‘eye’. Now, I sometimes see the most exquisite things in the most common places. Your eye becomes very sensitive and gives you the most wonderful visions!

can you run with scissors?

Making her Mark

Making her Mark

posted from Fosters, article can be found here

Sunday, June 13, 2010 by Bea Lewis bwheel@metrocast.net

Wen Redmond's journey as an artist began when she started making her own clothes as a teenager. 

Redmond went on to graduate from Mansfield State College in Pennsylvania with a degree in home economics. After retiring from teaching to marry and raise a family of three, she concedes she got "antsy" as her children grew and started making "artistic clothing." From there she evolved into making art quilts and now describes herself as a fiber artist.

"I've always been doing stuff even back in high school. I made my own clothes and prom dresses and just kept going. I love textiles," she said.

The League of New Hampshire Craftsmen has since juried Redmond in both stitchery and surface design. She has mastered a number of quilting and silk screening techniques. Along the way she said she still uses some of them as she creates a variety of wall-hangings and other pieces saying, "Because I know the rules now I can break them." 

Today, she combines painting and digital media into one-of-a-kind art pieces.

To make her holographic scenes, Redmond drapes silk organza — a transparent fabric — over photos of rocks, tree, utility poles and even her own shadow, giving the images a dreamy feel.

The elaborate surface designs that characterize Redmond's work are not serendipitous, but a deliberate effort to devise unique mark-making techniques.

She often takes her inspiration from nature but puts a unique twist on her digital photography, explaining she enjoys manipulating her photographs using Adobe PhotoShop. A photo of a rocky coastline on Deer Isle, Maine has been enlarged 10 fold and the lichen-covered rocks are now bathed in yellow instead of blue-green.

Explaining that she keeps an art journal, Redmond said she cuts potential ideas out of magazines and when looking at a mixed pile spread out on the floor waiting to be incorporated, she photographed "the pile of trash," and used the image to create the foundation for one of her pieces.

Dedicated to the creative process as a way of being, Redmond is attracted to the tactile quality of fabric and finds it ideal for rending a variety of subjects, including the natural world. As a fiber artist she is constantly challenging herself to do something she hasn't done before. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but she says the fun is in the doing and the learning. 

She is quick to point out, however, that mastery of a technique is not immediate, and that within every perceived failure are the seeds of future success.

She was just recently selected to teach at the Surface Design Association in Minneapolis in 2011 and was also tapped to teach fabric painting at "ProChem," a company that produces surface design material for painting textile crafts.

"What I enjoy most is the unexpected, just jumping in and seeing what happens," she said. "Now I'm manipulating photos in PhotoShop. With my holographic pieces I layer photos with fabric and it creates a whole different effect. I enjoy the exploration."

She will be demonstrating a variety of fabric painting techniques at the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen Shop in Meredith on Saturday, June 19 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Her work can be found at the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen stores in Meredith, Concord, North Conway, Nashua and Hanover. More of her work can also be viewed at www.wenredmond.com.

Fiber artist Wen Redmond discusses some of the techniques she used to create this piece on display at her Rollingsford studio. She will be demonstrating a host of fabric painting techniques at the Meredith League of New Hampshire Craftsmen shop on Saturday, June 19 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Bea Lewis/Citizen Photo