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QUILT GALLERY(Click on the quilt for a larger more detailed version)
Adam’s Outer Realm reflects Sharla’s interest in exploring color through the use of commercially produced fabric. This is the third quilt in Sharla’s Kaleidoscope series. In this quilt, the traditional kaleidoscope block breaks the boundaries of traditional formatting in the block itself. Sharla also explores content when making quilts. Adam’s
Outer Realm is made of universe fabrics and uses the kaleidoscope
pattern metaphorically to explore the transitional phase of both the mother
and her son as he graduates from high school and marches toward the rest
of his adult life. Life, like the kaleidoscope, is ever changing, often
beautiful, and almost always fleeting. Thus, motherhood, childhood, life,
change, loss, gain--all merge in this kaleidoscope quilt
The traditional roots found in Broken Dreams come from Trudie Hughes book, More Template Free Quilting. For variation the Colorado Log Cabin and Chimney and Cornerstones quilts are combined. Sharla made the stars, chimney and cornerstones from a light to dark gradation of fabrics, and changed the coloring in some of blocks. Sharla started a college design class at the same time she was completing this quilt and discovered the freedom of not planning everything out on paper. Through the tutelage of a phenomenal art professor, her confidence grew and she began to believe in her ability to be an artist. She took this back to her quilting and in Broken Dreams experimented with instinctual placement of the blocks until they felt right. This quilt was completed shortly after the death of that incredibly gifted professor and artist. This quilt is dedicated to the memory of her friend, teacher, and mentor Don Hendricks and carries the inscription: "He believed in my art. I carry his freely given knowledge, love and encouragement in my soul. Now I believe in my art." |
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Ruel’s Kaleidoscope represents many firsts. It’s the first quilt in the Kaleidoscope series. It’s Sharla’s first successful color study. It’s the first quilt where the design did not come directly from a traditional quilt pattern. It’s the first quilt she heavily machine quilted with metallic threads. It’s the first quilt she felt was completely her own. It’s the first quilt where she knew she would be making art quilts the rest of her life. It’s the first quilt that she entered into a national quilt show. And last but not least, it’s the first quilt that had the honor of being selected for two different awards.
The Power of Freedom is Sharla’s most original quilt and was designed to convey the concept: global freedom and the price it carries. At the time, the Berlin Wall had come down, the complexion of Europe was rapidly changing with the disintegration of the Eastern Block, the Soviet Union was breaking up, and apartheid in South Africa was crumbling. Inscribed on the back of this quilt are these words: Just as design, color and fluctuation of space influence the surface of this quilt, so does the power of freedom—an unstoppable force (depicted by yellow radiating lines) affect the fabric of global existence of each nation and individual. The different shapes and value gradations represent each country’s differences and varying degrees of freedom. The shimmer of metallics across the surface reflects the impact of the individual on a nation’s course toward peace, harmony and freedom. Just as the color across the surface is heightened by the black stripes, the individual effort of each man, woman and child to gain greater freedom and autonomy influences, weakens and diminishes black oppression. The overall harmony and balance expressed on the quilt surface is my personal hope for world peace, harmony, and freedom where everyone belongs to one race, the human race. May it be soon.
The last 2-3 years of Sharla's life has been busy writing books and immersing herself into the computer, developing this website & other such activies. This has resulted in only one or two quilts over that time. But she has taken a few minutes here and there to create a private garden for herself. The following medicine shields created in an "Art as Transformation Class" grace her Garden Retreat, to visit, click here. This is graphic heavy page and will take some time to load but it will be worth it. See some of the preview thumbnails below.
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