Fanfare for Sheila Frampton-Cooper

Imagine a stirring wave of music – let’s say, trumpets and kettle drums, at the very least.  It heralds a wonderful discovery – but before I share it with you, let me tell how I discovered it.

First of all, this is the view I get to see every day:

That is important because it influenced what happened when I went to the Texas Quilt Museum back in February.  Their back gallery had an exhibit of lots of miniature quilts donated by quilt makers from all over the country, for sale to raise funds for the museum.  When we walked in, the little quilts were already in place, but a docent was just putting up the cards with title, artist, and price, so I don’t think they had been on display for long.

I looked at all of them for inspiration, but I have a small house with not much room for art, so I wasn’t really planning on buying one.  Then I saw one that grabbed me, because it reminded me so much of the daily view out my window.  The imagery was evocative, the style was unique, and craftsmanship was fantastic – I knew it would inspire me to do my best work every single day.  So I bought it.

I want to redecorate my studio, and make this a focal point, but I took this picture (and then doctored it strongly with Photoshop to equalize the lighting of inside and outside) of the studio as it is now, to show the strong similarity between the quilt and the view.  If you didn’t know better, you could think that this particular view inspired this quilt. 

A few days ago I finally got around to looking at the quilter’s website, and I was just amazed.  And  that’s all I am going to say.  I want you to go see it too, and then you will know how very lucky I was to be able to buy this quilt.  So please check out the beautiful work of Sheila Frampton-Cooper!  I think her work will have you imagining fanfares too.