Excavating Inspiration

This image is from americanfossilhunt.com.

I propose that the artistic temperament is so because there is an almost overwhelming ability to find inspiration in the world.  It is hard for an Artist to look at things strictly as they are,  because there is always a depth, connection or revelation to be found in things.   At least that’s how I see the core of my creativity, that there is always more to express.  It’s fun to build inspirations upon each other, or to explore the form of something through a different form or to see how deconstructed and truly original you can make something.

My latest endeavor fuses inspiration I find in Mazon Creek fossils, with a wonderful sewing technique book called “Layered Cloth: The Art of Fabric Manipulation” by Ann Small.  She demonstrates how to layer several pieces of fabric, strategically sew patterns, then cut the layers away to various depths, to create lovely and tactile fabric art. I just love how textured the final piece can become, and how different sorts of fabric create these sensory landscapes that you have to touch to fully enjoy.

Mazon Creek is an area in Illinois that has produced copious fossils from an era of about 300 million years ago.  That area was once mined, and so towering piles of these concretions (the compacted sediment that contains the fossils) were brought to the surface.  The area is now protected, but formally led tours sometimes go in to collect fossils, and the concretions are sold online.  I bought a bag of these concretions and have been submitting them to the freeze/thaw method of getting them to pop open, and reveal the fossil.  As you can see in my collection below, I have mostly ferns, some ancient conifer needles, a flat seed and some possible enigmatic soft-bodied critters.

When they pop, I love knowing that I am the first human being to see these remains (presumably).  I love how the minerals in the sediment coalesce to enhance the forms of the fossils.  It’s all very inspiring!  So I decided to experiment with this layered fabric technique, and use fossil forms as my motifs.  I have made three so far, featuring a fern, spiraled shells and a sort of flowering-leafed plant.  My forthcoming post will show how I  created my Mazon Creek Layered Fabric Fossil Fern Quilt.  It’s a long title, but it’s worth it.  I will post it in a few days, as I need to finish my shell-themed quilt to include it.