Scarlett's 2006 Projects - Peacock Mythos and The Tale of the Cat
In 2006, Scarlett has worked on one big project that has resulted in 2 finished quilts. Besides being featured in a full page article in the local newspaper, the Record Searchlight, there were two radio programs, I-5 Live with Lorraine Dechter and the Saturday Showcase, which featured interviews with Scarlett and her two collaborators, Heather and Allena. The I-5 Live show was a one hour live program that covered anime and quilting, with everyone there in the studio.
The first quilt, "Peacock Mythos", was made for an invitational exhibit in Japan. The MyFab Invitational Quilt Exhibit was organized by Sumiko Minei and Atsuko Ohta of Tokyo. Fifty-four quilters from around the world are participating. Twenty Japanese, 8 American, 4 Canadian, 8 Australian, 6 British, 2 French, 2 Taiwanese, 1 Norwegian, 1 Korean and 2 Danish quilters have been invited to make a quilt for this special exhibit featuring MyFab, a new inkjet printable polyester crepe fabric.
Each quilter received 40 fabric sheets. All quilts for the exhibit have to use at least 25 sheets of this inkjet printable fabric in their design. The guidelines for the exhibit were very specific - only the inkjet printed fabric could be used, along with solid color fabrics. No other printed or patterned fabric could be in the quilt. Contrast quilting thread and embellishments were allowed, although no alterations to the printed fabric itself could be made.
Using an Epson Stylus Photo R1800 printer, original anime style images were printed on fabric for use in both of Scarlett's quilts. The artist is Allena Hail of Millville, CA. Lena drew 26 original characters, representing the Western and Eastern Zodiacs, plus 2 special characters, the Cat and Ophiuchus. She used her laptop computer, with a drawing tablet, to work on her designs. Some designs were sketched out on paper first, to be scanned or traced into her computer. Other designs were drawn directly on the computer, using the tablet and a stylus.
An original story was written by Heather Rose, Scarlett's niece, to explain each character and how they relate to one another. Heather did two versions of her story, with the longer story going on the back of Peacock Mythos. The shorter version, The Tale of the Cat, was placed on the front of the quilt of the same name.
Peacock Mythos - 78" (198cm) square
Designed and made by Scarlett Rose, with artwork by Allena Hail, an original story by Heather Rose and professional machine quilting by April Sproule.
This quilt will be on display in the second part of the MyFab exhibit appearing this year at the CK Media Gallery in Golden, Colorado from May 9th thru July 25th, as one of 34 International MyFab quilts. The first part of the MyFab Exhibit are the Japanese MyFab quilts, with pictures of some of these quilts posted online to give you an idea of what amazing quilts they are! The 20 Japanese MyFab quilts will on display from March 10th thru May 9th. So if you want to see all the MyFab quilts from around the world, you will have to visit the Gallery twice or keep checking the Gallery's site to see if they've posted more!
Peacock Mythos was on exhibit at the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival XVIII in Hampton, Virginia on February 22 -25th, 2007 and was also in the New Quilts of Northern California special exhibit at Pacific International Quilt Festival XVI in Santa Clara, California on Oct. 11th - 14th, 2007.
The Boar from the Chinese Zodiac. Hot fix crystals, in rainbow colors, were added to the machine quilting.
Taurus from the Western Zodiac. Each image had a different color frame appliqued around it before the teal silk frame of the peacock feather.
Here are Heather, Scarlett and Lena, in front of Peacock Mythos. This photo was taken during a press conference held at Hokema's Sewing & Vacuum in Redding, CA on November 15th, 2006.
Here are MP3 files of the I-5 Live interview, broken into 5 parts because of their size. If you have a slow connection or would prefer to listen to them later, you may want to use a right click and choose "Save Target As" to download the files to your computer first before listening to them. These files are available with permission from Lorraine Dechter of KFPR - Northstate Public Radio of Redding, California.
Part 1 - 4.21MB - 8:52 minutes - Introductions, discussion about manga (Japanese graphic novels)
Part 2 - 4.24MB - 8:44 minutes - Allena talks about her artwork, Scarlett explains the MyFab quilt exhibit, discussion about anime
Part 3 - 2.56MB - 5:16 minutes - Video gaming, costuming and other activities, more discussion of manga and anime
Part 4 - 4.82MB - 9:55 minutes - The process of how Scarlett designed "Peacock Mythos", information about the Western and Eastern Zodiac, Heather talks about her stories, discussion about the Fabled Fibers exhibit.
Heather Rose reading "The Tale of the Cat" - 3.54MB - 7:17 minutes - The complete story of "The Tale of the Cat".
After Heather was finished, each person gave their website information and talked about the upcoming local press conference for both quilts. That was the end of the live broadcast! For the one hour Saturday Showcase program, a 20 minute prerecorded segment aired with questions and answers. It was very similar to the live interview, but edited by Lorraine Dechter to fit the time allowed.
The smaller quilt Scarlett made is "The Tale of the Cat". Scarlett belongs to the QuiltArt online list and read a posting about The Fabled Fibers Exhibit organized by Ann Flaherty of North Carolina. This exhibit is a Quiltart.com challenge to create a collection of tales, in art quilt form, for children of all ages. The quilts will be put on display at various venues around the USA during 2007/2008. The premiere of the exhibit will be at the 2007 International Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas on Nov. 1st thru 4th. Then the exhibit will travel to the Rosenthal Gallery (910-672-1057) at Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, NC for display March 28, 2008 - April 11, 2008 with a reception on March 28, 2008, 7:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. Moving to the Vermont Quilt Festival Champlain Valley Expo, Essex Junction, VT, on June 27 -29, 2008. To see the other quilts, please go to The Fabled Fibers Exhibit part of QuiltArt or visit the Fabled Fibers website.
Ann is planning on publishing a selection of the quilts and stories from the Fabled Fiber challenge in a book for children and quilters. Profits from the sales of the book and a calendar will go to Operation Kid Comfort, the Armed Services YMCA program that provides photo-transfer comfort quilts and pillows to children of deployed service men and women of the US military.
The Tale of the Cat - 48" (122cm) square
Quilt designed, made and quilted by Scarlett Rose, with artwork by Allena Hail and story by Heather Rose.
A closeup of the center, showing the Dragon, the Sapphire Emperor in the story printed on the squares around the center.
As a result of this year-long collaboration, on April 6 thru 8, 2007, Scarlett attended the Tales of Anime convention in San Mateo, CA, to present a panel on using anime style art in quilts. Her niece, Heather Rose and graphic artist Allena Hail co-hosted the panel. The techniques covered were inkjet printing on fabric, applique and embroidery. Please visit the Peacock Mythos site at Cafepress to see the t-shirts and other items featuring one of Allena's anime style art drawings.
In 2007, Scarlett decided to make one more quilt using some of Lena's incredible Zodiac artwork. This became "From The East To The West", a quilt that has inkjet printed images and Celtic applique combined into a stunning design. To see this quilt, please visit Houston 2007. The Tale of the Cat and From The East To The West were on display at Houston for International Quilt Festival last November 2007.
This page was updated on 4-20-08