One day feeling uninspired, I took an online art class in another medium like they sometimes recommend when you are feeling stuck in your own art. One of the exercises in the class asked you to do a figure drawing from an online photograph. I thought it would be fun to apply that to quilting. Instead of pen and paper, I had bits of color fabric. I guess it is similar to how people do paper collage. The photo I was looking at was black and white. I chose a color (orange) in different values and tried to mimic the shapes and shadows just by looking at the picture. No pattern or drawing. Just my eyes and the scissors. And the first June was born.

I was pretty excited by how it came out and the new way of working. I shared it online and everyone really liked it. Like always happens, I had a hard time with a title for the quilt. This time I crowd-sourced it. Someone suggested "Reclining Rose". That didn't quite fit but it gave me an idea. In Puerto Rico the painting of Flaming June is very popular. My quilt has oranges too so I though of naming her June and since I want to do a series of them I concocted a plan that would make it easier to title my quilts and give me ideas for continuing the series.

*Flaming June by Sir Frederic Leighton, 1895*

Here are the series rules (if I chose to follow them):

The quilts will all have a female figure, named June (not necessarily the same person) preferably working free-form from a photo.
The title will be an adjective + June. The adjective will be alphabetical. That way I can tell how many and in what order I made them, it will give me a framework on which to title them and maybe an inspiration, if I'm uninspired.
The background could be simple to keep it more modern and minimalist focusing on the figure or it could be a technique I want to try (to keep me from straying from the series because there is something else I want to do).
It can (or not) reflect something that is going on in my life at the moment. I got this idea while working on the current June which will have cherry blossoms which are everywhere around here right now.

Second June

Here's the second quilt in the series. I want to enter an exhibit called Nostalgia. I started thinking about how nostalgia applies to the female figure and the answer was obvious. (Update 4/2023: I did not get in the exhibit 😞 )

I'm happy that my series concept is pretty open and can apply to many different ideas.

The Junes

Here are the series rules (if I chose to follow them):

Second June

My Mom

Cat-filled week