Just a couple of days ago I entered a quilt I recently finished for the Brno Patchwork Meeting (formerly Prague Patchwork Meeting). Because the 20 Perspectives Group will be exhibiting there I figured it would make a lot of sense to enter a quilt in one of their challenges. The topic 'Zero Waste' spoke to me as it seemed a good way to finally work out an idea I had been having for a while. This idea included using red plastic tops from syringes I had been collecting at work, caused by a misunderstaning on my part.
Because these little parts had a little hole at the top I thought this would extend all the way through, and I had collected quite a few of these before I realized my mistake. I mean, it doesn't really make a lot of sense that syringe stoppers would have a hole all the way through, and I don't quite understand why I harbored the idea, except maybe that my 'green' or 'ecological' heart was suffering badly when seeing all the plastic, wrapping, gadgets and instruments that go to waste in a dialysis practice every single day. And especially these red tops...
First stitches for this quilt began during the last summer already, and it was a long and laborious process. Somewhere along the line I also had the idea of including some more of the still relatively numerous embroideries by Afghan women in my stash (Guldusi Embroidery), and originally I had wanted to make it a rather turquoise/red quilt, for which I begged for turquoise scraps from my good quilting friend Bea @capricornquilts because I realized my abundance of turquiose scraps was low.
In the end the quilt turned out a lot less turquoise and red than I had envisioned. And the red tops needed a special kind of treatment to actually end up on the quilt top because, as I mentioned, the hole did not extend all the way and I could not stitch them onto the top. But I finished on the time before the deadline (which is still a week away! so early!), and I stayed within the size restrictions relatively easily because I was so smart to outline the size cirumference on my design wall with string and pins and thus managed to keep within the boundaries. And I had it professionally photographed - and then happened to delete the file accidentally and had to ask for it being resent. By that time I had gone north again, did not have a printer available, could not print out the entry form for the challenge nor download a workable version of the pdf-reader that would let me fill in the form digitally. I had to ask at work whether I could print out the file from my private mail account... fill it in by hand, take a photo of it, turn it into a pdf and send it ... it was a thorny way indeed before I managed to get in that entry.
As I have also decided to try and enter it for SAQA's Europe/Middle East call for entry "Wide Horizons" (deadline end of this month) I am not showing any other pictures right now. The jury for Wide Horizons should have decided before the meeting in Brno, so I figure a double entry is not outside the rules, which don't say 'must not have been shown anywhere before' anyway.
I also hope to have a second entry finished for Wide Horizons, perhaps, which, should it not get accepted, could be entered somewhere else. Give them many chances...
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