The Quilt Skipper

quilting makes me skip for joy

Jenny K Lyon

Quilting makes me skip for joy

SAQA Conference 2018-San Antonio

I spent 4 fabulous days in San Antonio Texas at the annual Studio Art Quilt Associates Conference. I always find it difficult to describe why I make it a point to go as often as I can. One of the best things is the people:

Two of my art heroes, Jane Dunnewold and Marianne Williamson
Table mates Susie Monday, Christine Nielsen, Michele Lasker, So sorry-I lost that name, Deborah Boschert, Michelle Trachtman

You find yourself hanging out with the most amazing people! And everyone there gets you-they’re all artists too after all. I met so many people and learned so much about…everything from teaching to travel to food and of course art. I met people from Portugal, Canada, Australia, Norway. And you would too if you attended.

Turtle Hand Batiks panel, Bag hand dyed by Texas members, my auction piece by Margaret Abramshe, Book by Jane Dunnewold, SAQA book Abstract and Geometric, and a Jane Dunnewold piece plus some Mistyfuse and custom batik squares for good measure.

I arrived on Thursday just in time for Market and the damage was light. Above are what I accumulated throughout the Conference.

It was fun getting to know San Antonio. I used to live in Texas and remember San Antonio as friendly and unique–and it still is. We all took a cruise on the Riverwalk, right at sunset, so we enjoyed day, dusk and dark.

The San Antonio architecture was beautiful and the influence of the Spanish and Mexican settlers was evident. Just a few vignettes:

The landscaping was gorgeous:

Brugmansia in full bloom
Cypress Tree “knees”
Yellow Crowned Night Heron with huge nest

I had a corner room and a great view of the city. The night views were the best:

Part of Saturday was left for exploring. The day was nippy but I headed off for a walk to the Blue Star Gallery area and hit a few galleries. Wished I’d gotten a photo with my companions Christine Hager-Braun, Cindy Grisdela  and Michael Ross. This was an interesting installation:

Installation piece by Sarah Fox.

Jane Dunnewold, Ordering Chaos, plus those cool chairs!

Jane Dunnewold had a grouping of pieces available for sale. I missed getting photos of some of her newer work:-(

Saturday night was the auction-209 pieces of 4″ x 6″ original art by SAQA members. There were so many strong pieces-one went for $1,000 and another $1910!

Susan Else, First Thing

This 3-d piece by Susan Else was highly prized. I was amused by the buyers pen-see how its tip matches the piece!

I was thrilled that my piece (wrote about it here) was purchased by Dorothy Raymond! (Sorry for the fuzzy photo)

I restrained myself but just had to have this piece by Margaret Abramshe. I can look at this daily and find something new. Love it!

Sarah Entsminger, Jayne Gaskins, Holly Brackmann, Gul Laporte

Sometimes you really had to defend your bid against competition like this!

There was a great exhibit by the Texas members that I will cover in another post. There were also breakout sessions on teaching and art, and keynote speeches by Meg Cox and Jane Dunnewold. My head is full of ideas and things that I MUST do!

It was hard to leave and go back to normal life. Next year Conference is in San Jose so I will definitely be there! I’ll be linking up with Nine-Marie’s Off the Wall Friday where all the good links are!

Comments

  1. Jenny, thanks for the glowing report from the SAQA San Antonio conference. It reminded me of my excitement at being in Santa Fe for the 2013 one. Great pictures for this Texas native (lived in Austin and Corpus Christi and visited SA often). And your take-home stuff looks like Christmas.
    I was interested in the flowers–“Brugmansia in full bloom”–I’ve only know them as Angel Trumpet. I looked up this name to verify it is the same flower and was amazed to see that it comes in more colors than white, peach, and yellow. Even dark blue!