Our Artists:

Abstract fabric turns into wearable art

Name: Lynne’ Genevieve Sleiman Age: 44 Town: near Diamond Lake/Newport Artistic medium: Currently fabric and embroidery Q: Why do you make this type of art?

A: I am a professional seamstress and used to work at a bridal shop and more recently at a fitting room in Dallas. At both jobs I had the opportunity to keep sample scraps of fabric that couldn’t be used for clothing (because the pieces were small) but were brand new! Really high-quality beautiful fabric. Since I have always drawn, painted, visual journaled and so on, turning fabric into pieces of art with crazy quilting and embroidery just felt like a perfect creative outlet. It not only keeps my sewing skills sharp, but also feeds my creativity and desire to make beautiful things from discarded, unwanted scraps.

Q: What does your artwork represent?

A: Crazy quilting has an abstract art look to it, but I enjoy florals and so add many vines and such to my work. I created a coloring book of hand drawn roses on Amazon that I have also used as embroidery patterns. Often crazy quilts (especially if you make Christmas stockings!) are full of memories. So specific colors and what I embroider might be of some color or moment that reminds me of a memory I want to keep.

Q: What inspires you? A: Nature, other artists, and I love watching art process videos, which is why I started making my own of the embroidery how-to process. I am also inspired by the fabric when I am designing a crazy quilt block. I usually have a color combination that I am thinking of and will pull out those fabrics and just see what shapes and shades look good near each other.

Q: How do you make it? A: Crazy quilt pieces are assembled on a stabilizer type fabric, like a cotton or muslin. You generally start in the middle with one small piece and then add more pieces and colors all around. You can also add applique elements for rounded fabric shapes. I try not to use the same fabric twice in a crazy quilt block and balancing the colors in a pleasing way is always a fun challenge!

Then the fun part is adding all the embroidery to every seam. What this does too is make the finished piece more secure and the satins and velvet-type fabrics less likely to wear out as quickly (so there is a practical reason as well as for the beauty of it) — some crazy quilt artists add buttons or beads. It is very much like the visual journaling branch of the quilting/sewing world. I love the freestyle nature of this style of sewing and the beautiful satins, but many quilters find exactly that very difficult. When you sew the pieces together you don’t use a pattern, so every block is unique!

Q: What does your art mean to you?

A: As a little child I sewed more than I drew, and I was always interested in clothes and fashion. As I grew older, I started sewing more dresses or costumes and then began altering clothes and making my own patterns. It was frustrating to me that a pattern wouldn’t fit correctly or was close to what I wanted, but not exactly. The creativity it takes to take a garment and make it fit a specific person or to repair antique lace or to alter a wedding dress or any of the number of sewing things that I have done in my career is not generally something people know enough about to see. Also, when you alter or repair something the nature of that job is that you CAN’T see all that went into it. If something fits like a glove or is repaired to look brand new, you literally can’t see what happened to create that.

But with crazy quilt embroidery it happens to be a creative outlet that displays all the intricacies. Some people might even say it is too much! Too flashy or too much embellishment (other embroidery artists add even more than I do, so it is just a matter of taste) — so I guess what it means to me is taking that behind-the-scenes quiet skill and giving it a voice and platform. Instead of the sewing that becomes invisible, it is the loud, lovely, “noisy” sewing. And it is also taking the beautiful bits and moments and honoring them when otherwise the box of sample fabrics would have ended up in a landfill. I feel like in so many parts of my life I try to do this, take what I have (that maybe other people don’t even see the value in) and remake it into something beautiful.

Q: Do you have any exhibits/ shows coming up?

A: I currently don’t have any physical exhibits coming up; however, I post videos of the embroidery process on Instagram at @handlewithart and even if people don’t want to learn the embroidery stitches themselves it can still be relaxing to watch them. Trying to do my part to add more lovely things on social media for people to enjoy! Watching art videos can be a good thing for our mental health as well. And that will be the place that I share any new website or embroidery project that I am working on.