A quilter since the 1980’s, Joanne Baeth started making art quilts after she retired from a career in teaching. Her favorite subject for her art quilts is creating realistic scenes in nature as evidenced by her winning entry, Sea Breeze.
The inspiration for Sea Breeze was twofold. For two months every summer, Joanne and her husband salmon fishon the Oregon coast. The coastal scenes that surround them for those two months was part of her inspiration. More inspiration for this art quilt came from her sister who has a beach house. On one of the walls of her house, her sister has hanging several floats that she has collected from her walks on the beach. Those floats provided the rest of Joanne’s inspiration for Sea Breeze.
Joanne began this art quilt right after Road to California 2018 ended. She started with painting and cutting out the floats then thread painting the crab pots and small background trees. Joanne shared that the work on the floats was done while she was camping in California. The bait shop, boats, and small buildings in the background were cut out and fused one board at a time. The roofs were painted and heat distressed for more texture. The sky was painted and the water was constructed with many strips of fabric. Extensive machine quilting completed the art quilt.
The Director’s Choice Award is chosen by Road to California’s owner, Matt Reese. Joanne didn’t find out that she had won this prestigious award until she walked in to the show on Thursday and saw it hanging in the front of the Exhibit Hall.
She immediately called her husband and a few friends to share the good news. Joanne said she was “thrilled” to receive this award. She was also “thrilled to attend the show and talk to attendees about my quilt.”
What did Joanne do with the prize money for her winning art quilt? She “spent part of the prize money at Road – lots of great vendors.”
Congratulations, Joanne Baeth, for your winning entry.
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It was a fabulous quilt!
I just Loved her quilt Beautifully done. So Real.
Congratulations