San Diego Union-Tribune
Sunday, August 1, 2004
Homescape Almanac

 

Mini works of art

A few years ago, Jane LaFazio of Rancho Bernardo read a magazine story about art quilts. The idea intrigued her.

She’d been sewing on paper already – “I’d painted a watercolor landscape of Poway and stitched the outline of the mountains on my sewing machine,” she said – and wondered if she could transfer those talents to art quilts.

After her sewing machine gave up the ghost and a few thousand hand stitches later, LaFazio has stopped wondering if she can do it. Several of her quilts were selected to appear in a new book, “Material Visions, A Gallery of Miniature Art Quilts” ($19.95, Stampington & Co.).

LaFazio answered a “call to creativity,” a recurring feature in Somerset Studio magazine (also published by Stampington), in which readers are asked to contribute ideas. “The response for art quilts was so overwhelming that we felt it deserved a book,” said Jenny Doh, Somerset Studio’s editor in chief. “And I just loved Jane’s stuff, and I loved the fact that she charted her own path; she never took classes – she did it all on her own.”

LaFazio, who can’t estimate how long it takes her to finish an art quilt except to say it takes her “huge amounts of time,” uses beads, embroidery, paper, canvas, paper, fabric, charms, found objects and other items on her quilts.

They vary in size (one called “Mockingbird” is 9-by-11 inches), but are nowhere near the size of a real quilt – “I have no desire to do anything practical, like something for a bed,” she said, laughing. See more of LaFazio’s work and find out how to purchase it at www.plainjanestudio.com.

Others artists from around the country whose works appear in “Material Visions” include Christine Adolph, Bridget Hoff, Teesha Moore, Amanda Perkins, Susan Shie and Beryl Taylor.

“Material Visions” can be ordered at the Stampington Web site, www.stampington.com.

– CATHY LUBENSKI