Flight
by Natasha Gardner
51” X 59”
As a journalist, my days are filled with words, and so it feels natural that text frequently finds its way into my quilting. For this work, I began with a small piece of hand-dyed fabric with brilliant oranges and greens. It seemed too small to base a quilt design on, but I loved the vibrant colors; I left the cloth on my studio table for a few weeks. One day, I started folding the edges to create shapes that mimicked the broken dishes pattern. I found that the sharp triangle points gave a sense of direction that highlighted the text, but created movement. I pulled several other hand-dyed fabrics from my quilt stash to build a chain that flowed up and down. For the background, I highlighted two green tones from the original fabric in an effort to create a modern landscape—with geese that separate land and sky.