Karen Miller - Two Exhibitions at the Corvallis Arts Center

Karen Miller has two shows at the Corvallis Arts Center to report.

The first is open now through the end of August. It is called "The Art of Plankton" The work is all inspired by the photographs taken by an OSU oceanography professor and includes paintings, prints, glass, quilts, ceramics, sculpture and installations. My piece is an installation of silk organza panels depicting diatoms which hang and float in the center of the room.

The second show, which will hang October 2 to Nov 3 in the CAC Corinne Woodman Gallery will include a series of small quilts using the stencil dyed indigo fabrics I have made from the summer snow patterns of the peaks of the entire Cascade Range, from Mt Baker south to Mt Shasta. It is my response to global warming and the potential loss of these familiar mountain views of glaciers and snowfields.

Karen is also teaching a katazome class at the Sitka Center in late September. There is a link on Karen's website.

Portland Parlor Meeting

The Portland Parlor SAQA group meet Wednesday at Gerrie Congdon's home.Thanks for hosting, Gerrie! Time was spent talking further about our photo class at New Space. The consensus was that we all fell more confident to photograph our own quilts. Our next meeting will be August 15th at Elizabeth's house. Same schedule, 10am-12pm. Mary Ann McCammon will be giving us a presentation on rhythm, one of the secondary design elements. Two people volunteered to bring snacks for the meeting.

Wednesday's meeting was focused on critiquing following the Jane Dunnewold's guidelines, "Learning to Critique Effectively." We were able to critique several quilts following her guidelines. The purpose of the meeting was to concentrate on the process, which allowed us to take more time with each piece. Overall, we were pleased with group critique. It was very thoughtful and productive. We decided we may want to dedicate several meetings a year for this alone. It was nice to be sharing our work with one another.

I am interested in doing some planning for the next year's meetings. September seems to be the start of a new year. If you would email with some feedback of what you would like to see happen in our monthly meetings and in our quarterly meetings(following CFG meetings). Topics of interest, sharing one's expertise, guest speakers such as artist from other mediums,and another gallery meeting are a few examples of subjects/topics we could focus on in our meetings. I look forward to hearing from you and I would encourage help on planning our upcoming year. Any volunteers!

Thanks to all and enjoy the rest of your summer. Betty Daggett

Portland Parlor Group Meeting July 18

The Portland Parlor Group will meet this Wednesday, July 18 at Gerrie Congdon's home from 10am-12pm. Contact Gerrie for directions. This will be a meeting concentrating on critiquing and working with various methods of critique. Members are asked to bring a piece of finished work to be critiqued by the group. We are calling this a practice/learning session. Gerrie will provide tea and coffee and asks that people bring food to share. Any questions on directions email or call Gerrie.

An Update from Shirley MacGregor

I was lucky to be able to take part in Her Presence in Color X as part of the American faction. This took place over a period of one week. In 2014 it will be held in Mongolia. Here is a little about the exhibition and the events.

Her Presence in Color X was held in Vietnam June this year and featured the art of about 212 women artists representing 20 different countries. The biennial event was formed in 1993 in Asia and has grown to include many countries. We were fortunate to host the congregation here in Portland, Oregon, two years ago. To learn more about this organization visit the website.

The theme of the exhibition, "Women's Art - a New Direction in Global Culture," was conceived to reflect the common vision and mission of the women artists and their aspiration for the development of a new global culture. The intent is to focus on the human aspects of life and their concern of women artists for a sustainable environment.

The Vietnam Museum of Fine Arts, the venue for the exhibition, is an old French colonial building and a wonderful place for the show. Museum officials generously provided two floors of one building and plenty of space for the exhibition. An adjacent (and virtually identical) building holds a wonderful collection of contemporary art.

The conference Her Presence in Color X featured more than just the exhibition. There was a seminar at HCMC Fine Art University in which each country's representative presented their take on the theme, "Women's Art - a New Direction in Global Culture."

Another feature of the conference was a painting day where each artist was given two ceramic plates to paint, which were subsequently fired and finished. It was amazing what the artists came up with.

We were also taken across town to a gallery of HCMC Fine Art Association to see a collection of wonderful lacquer painting art. Also at the end we were treated to a farewell party at an artist colony on the river. What a fantastic ending this was!

I have posted pictures and more on my website.
Shirley MacGregor

Currents Gallery Third Annual Fiber Show Call for Entries

Summer is here.... time to think about Fall..... and the Third Annual Fiber Show at Currents Gallery, 532 NE Third Street, McMinnville, Oregon, opening 20th October, 2012.

This is the preview notice. A formal call and application will be sent out next week. But we wanted you to know some of the details now:

DATES:
Art to Currents Gallery...... October 5th-October 9th.
Jurying ..............................October 10th
Show hangs.......................October 16th
Opening.............................October 20th.

*Art-to-wear
*3-d pieces
*Wall hangings
*Quilts
...and more

*Sewn
*Knitted
*Felted
*Riveted
*Welded, whittled, carved and........

All items must be for sale.

There will be a $25.00 jury fee for up to 3 pieces. A group of similar items will count as one item, eg. scarves in the same style, bags in the same style, etc.

$15.00 will be credited to the Gallery commission for the first item sold.

Details will be available on our website, http://www.currentsgallery.com/, by July 20th.

Please forward this info to every fiber artist you know !

Many thanks for your past support. We look froward to another successful Fiber Arts show.
Ilsa Perse for Currents Gallery

SAQA Oregon June Newsletter from Jean Wells

Betty and I have been busy organizing parlor groups and making plans for the coming year. Betty did travel to the conference and it was wonderful. Next April it will be in Santa Fe and we are both planning to go. Not only are the conferences good but what a great place to visit and get inspired.

I did receive the grant I applied for from SAQA and it will pay for the venue for the state conference that Betty and I are planning for September of 2013. It will be at the same time as the Portland Expo so that you can come and attend both events. We would love ideas from all of you about what you would like at the conference in terms of speakers and subjects to be covered. Think about what you would really like to know.

We have some great Central Oregon news. Seventeen art quilters teamed u with the National Forest Foundation and the United States Forest service to bring attention to the rivers (Wychus and Metolius) that frame the Sisters Country by creating wall quilts with a river flowing through it plus four vertical wall hangings. They turned out spectacular and will be at Black Butte Ranch in June, quilt show in July, Pacific West, Quilt Expo. You can go online at Sistersoutdoorquiltshow.org and see the instillation.

12" x 12" x 12" Challenge
As most of you know SAQA has a new definition of a quilt. The new definition of the art quilt is "a creative visual work that is layered or that references this form of stitched layered structure". The Portland group is having a challenge based on it and we would like to extend it to the state and western Washington. Then we would like to display them at the conference and I will come up with a viewer's choice prize of some. Go to our blogspot for details (SAQAOregon.blogspot.com)

Anyone in Oregon and southwest Washington is welcome to visit a parlor group.

Portland Parlor Group - from Betty
Portland Parlor group meetings continue to be energetic with good attendance. Our last meeting was held at 23 Sandy. Laura Russell is the gallery owner. Through Nancy Dasenbrock contact with Laura, we were invited to the gallery for our meeting as well as speaking to us about curating, critiquing, and her feelings about art merging to include many mediums, including cloth.

Our general meeting included more conversation on critiquing, examining closer an article by Jane Dunnewold, "Learning to Critique Effectively." Our July meeting will be spent critiquing a quilt we have finished (not necessarily new work). We also had further discussion on the new SAQA definition of what is a quilt and our challenge is due in October. The piece should be 12" x 12" x 12." We will include dimensional work to the challenge as the new definition

The group enjoyed meeting at 23 Sandy and we look forward to meetings at other galleries in the future. Our group is becoming more cohesive as we meet and become better acquainted with one another.

Eugene Parlor Group - from Georgia
Fourteen of us showed up at Market of Choice yesterday for a lively meeting! Six of us spoke to our current focus for the year; this was helpful and I think it always reinforces me when I put my goal "out there" --- it adds a measure of accountability!

We seem to want to explore effective critiquing, so with that in mind, let's all review the information from Sandra Sider and Jane Dunnewold --- see the SAQA Oregon blog. I think I will ask for a few volunteers to put up a piece for critique next time, and we'll make a start. I'll send out a reminder a bit before our meeting, but do be thinking about what makes a good critique, and about what kind of information you want from a critique.

Our next meeting will be Friday, July 20th, at 1:30pm, at the Market of Choice at 29th & Willamette, Eugene.

Central Oregon Parlor Group from Jean
At our last meeting in March Ruth Ingham gave a comprehensive presentation on composition. As she is a painter as well as a quilter her extensive training made her presentation very interesting. Carol Webb facilitated a productive critique session and there was show and tell. Our next meeting is June 15 in Sisters at my home and we will be discussing where we want to go from here and how often to meet since it has been over a year since we began meeting. I just found out about a "whisper project" that I would like to suggest to the group.

The artist reception for the Two Rivers exhibit will be at 5:00 at Black Butte Ranch so I think we will meet at 2:00 PM at The Stitchin' Post so people can go from there.

SAQA Oregon Quarterly Meeting in Portland
SAQA Oregon will be having a quarterly meeting on June 13th, prior to the June Columbia FiberArts Guild meeting at the Colossae Church in Tigard. The address of the Colossae Church is 12176 SW Garden in Tigard, Or. The church will be available to us at 5:00 pm. CFG meeting will begin at 7:00pm and were planning for it's members to arrive at 6:30, The quarterly meeting will include members from various areas of the state so time will be spent sharing what is happening in other groups. Now that we have gained a schedule of Parlor meetings and quarterly meetings, we should do some planning for our future quarterlies as to topics of exploration or consider speakers or presenters periodically. As always members are free to bring works to share but there will not be time for critiques. Small donations will be accepted for use of the space since they do not charge us a fee.

Sisters September Meeting
Several of you are signed up for either Gloria Laughlin or Sue Benner the week of September 24 - 28 at the Art Quilt Symposium in Sisters through the Stitchin' Post. On Thursday I have asked Sue and Gloria to give short talks on their work and we will also have a SAQA trunk show. I will send out more information when I have it but anyone is invited to come.

Jean Wells, Oregon rep

Congratulations, Gerrie Congdon!

Gerrie Congdon is the featured artist this week on the Janome website.  Check it out here.  Congratulations, Gerrie!