Scarlett's 2006 Projects - Peacock Mythos and The Tale of the Cat
In 2006, Scarlett worked on one big project that resulted in 2 finished quilts. In 2007, Scarlett made another quilt, From the East to the West, continuing this anime quilt series. Besides being featured in a full page article in the local newspaper, the Record Searchlight, there were two radio programs, I-5 Live with Lorraine Dechter and the Saturday Showcase, which featured interviews with Scarlett and her two collaborators, Heather and Allena. The I-5 Live show was a one hour live program that covered anime and quilting, with everyone there in the studio.
The first quilt, "Peacock Mythos", was originally made for an invitational exhibit in Japan. The MyFab Invitational Quilt Exhibit was organized by Sumiko Minei and Atsuko Ohta of Tokyo. Fifty-four quilters from around the world participated. Twenty Japanese, 8 American, 4 Canadian, 8 Australian, 6 British, 2 French, 2 Taiwanese, 1 Norwegian, 1 Korean and 2 Danish quilters have been invited to make a quilt for this special exhibit featuring MyFab, a new inkjet printable polyester crepe fabric.
Each quilter received 40 fabric sheets. All quilts for the exhibit were required to use at least 25 sheets of this inkjet printable fabric in their design. The guidelines for the exhibit were very specific - only the inkjet printed fabric could be used, along with solid color fabrics. No other printed or patterned fabric could be in the quilt. Contrast quilting thread and embellishments were allowed, although no alterations to the printed fabric itself could be made.
Using an Epson Stylus Photo R1800 printer, the original anime style images were printed on fabric for use in all of Scarlett's anime series of quilts. The artist is Allena Hail of Millville, CA. Lena drew 26 original characters, representing the Western and Eastern Zodiacs, plus 2 special characters, the Cat and Ophiuchus. She used her laptop computer, with a drawing tablet, to work on her designs. Some designs were sketched out on paper first, to be scanned or traced into her computer. Other designs were drawn directly on the computer, using the tablet and a stylus.
An original story was written by Heather Rose, Scarlett's niece, to explain each character and how they relate to one another. Heather did two versions of her story, with the longer story going on the back of Peacock Mythos. The shorter version, The Tale of the Cat, was placed on the front of the quilt of the same name. Another short story set in the same universe as the first two, is on the back of the third quilt, From the East to the West.
Peacock Mythos - 78" (198cm) square
Designed and made by Scarlett Rose, with artwork by Allena Hail, an original story by Heather Rose and professional machine quilting by April Sproule.
The Quilter's Newsletter/CK Media Gallery in Golden, Colorado, displayed Scarlett's quilt Peacock Mythos as one of 34 International MyFab Quilts in Part II of the MyFab exhibit that ran from May 9th thru August 1st, 2008. There were 20 Japanese MyFab quilts on display in Part 1.
Peacock Mythos was on exhibit at the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival XVIII in Hampton, Virginia on February 22 -25th, 2007 and was also in the New Quilts of Northern California special exhibit at Pacific International Quilt Festival XVI in Santa Clara, California on Oct. 11th - 14th, 2007.
September 10th thru 19th, 2008 - Four of Scarlett's Asian style quilts were displayed in the Asian Artists of Shasta County exhibit at the Old City Hall Art Gallery in Redding, CA. Scarlett's quilts were Peacock Mythos, Symbols & Seasons of Japan, At The Water's Edge and Tsukiko. Scarlett's niece, Heather, also had several of her quilts, including the Changing Faces of Japan, and some haiku she wrote, on display. Besides her online journal, which includes a gallery of her pictures and writing, Heather also has a vlog on Youtube. An artist's reception was held from 6pm - 9pm on Sept. 13th and was also a part of the 2nd Saturday ArtHop. Two local newspapers, the Record Searchlight and the Valley Post, wrote articles about Scarlett's quilts.
Peacock Mythos is one of five of Scarlett's quilts published in Quilter's Newsletter magazine. In this #409 April/May 2009 issue, Scarlett is featured in a two page Meeting Place article. Her niece Heather and their friend Allena are also mentioned in the article!
Scarlett & her niece Heather at the Artist's Reception held at the Old City Hall Gallery, Redding, CA.
The Boar from the Chinese Zodiac. Hot fix crystals, in rainbow colors, were added to the machine quilting.
Taurus from the Western Zodiac. Each image had a different color frame appliqued around it before the teal silk frame of the peacock feather.
Here are Heather, Scarlett and Lena, in front of Peacock Mythos. This photo was taken during a press conference held at Hokema's Sewing & Vacuum in Redding, CA on November 15th, 2006.
Here are MP3 files of the I-5 Live interview, broken into 5 parts because of their size. If you have a slow connection or would prefer to listen to them later, you may want to use a right click and choose "Save Target As" to download the files to your computer first before listening to them. These files are available with permission from Lorraine Dechter of KFPR - Northstate Public Radio of Redding, California.
Part 1 - 4.21MB - 8:52 minutes - Introductions, discussion about manga (Japanese graphic novels)
Part 2 - 4.24MB - 8:44 minutes - Allena talks about her artwork, Scarlett explains the MyFab quilt exhibit, discussion about anime
Part 3 - 2.56MB - 5:16 minutes - Video gaming, costuming and other activities, more discussion of manga and anime
Part 4 - 4.82MB - 9:55 minutes - The process of how Scarlett designed "Peacock Mythos", information about the Western and Eastern Zodiac, Heather talks about her stories, discussion about the Fabled Fibers exhibit.
Heather Rose reading "The Tale of the Cat" - 3.54MB - 7:17 minutes - The complete story of "The Tale of the Cat".
After Heather was finished, each person gave their website information and talked about the upcoming local press conference for both quilts. That was the end of the live broadcast! For the one hour Saturday Showcase program, a 20 minute prerecorded segment aired with questions and answers. It was very similar to the live interview, but edited by Lorraine Dechter to fit the time allowed.
The smaller quilt Scarlett made on 2006 is "The Tale of the Cat". Scarlett belongs to the QuiltArt online list and read a posting about The Fabled Fibers Exhibit organized by Ann Flaherty of North Carolina. This exhibit is a Quiltart.com challenge to create a collection of tales, in art quilt form, for children of all ages. The quilts will be put on display at various venues around the USA during 2007/2008. The premiere of the exhibit will be at the 2007 International Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas on Nov. 1st thru 4th. Then the exhibit will travel to the Rosenthal Gallery (910-672-1057) at Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, NC for display March 28, 2008 - April 11, 2008 with a reception on March 28, 2008, 7:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. Then the Vermont Quilt Festival Champlain Valley Expo, Essex Junction, VT, on June 27 -29, 2008. During the month of November, *Fabled Fibers: Art Quilt Enchantments* was shown at the Harnett Council Arts Council and Harnett County Library, Main Branch, in downtown Lillington, North Carolina.
Ann Flaherty also shared the Fabled Fiber quilts with the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade classes (over 650 students) of the Southern Harnett Elementary Schools in December. Ann had visited a friend's class at the school with some of the quilts and had a great time. The kids were so enthusiastic and asked thoughtful questions. The school's prinicipal was in the class and asked her back to address the entire school. Ann said "Many of the kids are from military families (at least 60% of them) and they appreciate your efforts to bring attention to the trials they go through.
Delight, enchantment and glee were the overwhelming responses to your work. They knew the stories...from Aesop's and Aladdin to Sleeping Beauty, these amazed me at the knowledge they have of fables, folk tales and fairy tales. One child pointed out how the Raven is a trickster...she was in third grade!!!
It was a great experience and I'm so glad I had this time with such wonderful children."
Ann planned on publishing a selection of the quilts and stories from the Fabled Fiber challenge in a book for children and quilters. Profits from the sales of the book and a calendar will go to Operation Kid Comfort, the Armed Services YMCA program that provides photo-transfer comfort quilts and pillows to children of deployed service men and women of the US military.
The Tale of the Cat - 48" (122cm) square
Quilt designed, made and quilted by Scarlett Rose, with artwork by Allena Hail and story by Heather Rose.
A closeup of the center, showing the Dragon, the Sapphire Emperor in the story printed on the squares around the center.
As a result of this year-long collaboration, on April 6 thru 8, 2007, Scarlett attended the Tales of Anime convention in San Mateo, CA, to present a panel on using anime style art in quilts. Her niece, Heather Rose and graphic artist Allena Hail co-hosted the panel. The techniques covered were inkjet printing on fabric, applique and embroidery.
In 2007, Scarlett decided to make one more quilt using some of Lena's incredible Zodiac artwork. This became "From The East To The West", a quilt that has inkjet printed images and Celtic applique combined into a stunning design.
To see more of this quilt, please visit Houston 2007. The Tale of the Cat and From The East To The West were on display at Houston for International Quilt Festival in November 2007.
This page was updated on 11-26-2020