Last Thursday I went to Pacific International Quilt Festival (PIQF) at the Santa Clara Convention Center. Boy, was it a blast! I got there just a few minutes before it opened at 10am. There were hordes of white haired ladies chomping at the bit to enter the doors to textile overload. As they danced around, the door handlers started the countdown - 10, 9, 8 ... 3, 2, 1! Cheers, then a stampede as they passed the doors. Too funny. But I'm not kidding when I said that there were lots of people there. It was extremely crowded but oh so worth it. I took a gazillion pictures, but in my excitement to snap a pic before someone walked in the shot, most were blurred. Egads, the horror. Oh well, here's some of the better pictures of my favorite quilts.
Chart 7 - Reflections by Marianne Falkuss
Unbridled Passion by Denise Havlan
Metamorphosis by Wendy Brown
Costa Rica - Pura Vide by Janice Johnson ... Look closely, the large elements are t-shirts from her vacation to Costa Rica.
Girl with Teacup by Bodil Gardner
Figures at Rest by Bodil Gardner - Gotta love the folk art quality of these quilts. Don't they make you feel cheerful?
Touching Threads Green by Renate Flohr
Genesis - A New Beginning by Janice Ellerston
Stars for Arden by Ronda K. Beyer
I noticed a trend in some of the quilts at the show. Look closely at the last two quilts and you'll see it for yourself. More people are using the heat-set Swarovski crystals as elements in their quilts. They're hard to photograph, oh, but they give such a sparkle to them. I think they make a nice touch to art quilts.
Well those were some of my favorites. As you can tell, the massive amounts of bright colors are what usually grabs my attention. Not to say that there weren't plenty of quilts that were more subtle. And I even took some pics of those too. But broad strokes of color always attract my attention first. Next time I'll have to stop and really take the proper amount of time when photographing these beauties.
I'd love to go to one of the major quilt shows like PIQF! Your photos are stunning! But more importantly, what did you buy from the vendors?
Posted by: Judi Wellnitz | October 15, 2007 at 11:40 AM
lovely quilts!
Posted by: inge | October 15, 2007 at 12:52 PM
Wow! Thats some major work invested in those quilts!!
Posted by: Steph | October 15, 2007 at 07:16 PM
Thanks for the virtual quilt show. Love the greens one!http://nikisventures.blogspot.com/
Posted by: niki | October 16, 2007 at 04:48 AM
I'd love to attend this show. Thanks for sharing the inspiration.
Posted by: kathy | October 16, 2007 at 09:32 PM
Good for the white haired ladies (I am one).
Posted by: Christine Thresh | October 20, 2007 at 08:10 PM
What beautiful quilts!! Thanks for sharing them!
Posted by: Claudia | October 24, 2007 at 08:39 PM
I had to laugh. We were there the same day. I took pics of totally different quilts! I had to go back up and check to see if it was PIQF or not. =)
Posted by: Susan | October 27, 2007 at 09:58 PM
They all are Beautiful quilts but I love the Touching Threads Green and the Stars for Arden.
Posted by: Belém | November 06, 2007 at 10:25 AM