more on this quilt later.
Since I have begun going to group sewing weekends I’ve become even more acutely aware of my preference for working alone. First, I’ve known this all along; second, I’m pretty sure that many quiltmaker feel the same way about have to make a quilt while other watch; it is a unique sort of voyeurism.
It is a social choice, of course, to attend the group session and as many will attest to the main goal being more social than it is efficient in the making of an object. So I know this, and the difference is not in how much more aware I am of the experience, but rather the ways in which it alters how and what I do in my quiltmaking. Choice of project becomes very important; one’s choice must take into account so many factors: time needed to complete, skill level, availability of materials, etc.
So after a recent retreat at Bob and Jim’s Woodstock, NY quilt shop I returned to the studio to more closely identify what I do that makes quilting alone significant. And primarily what I found was that in addition to the lack of voyeurism or the “quiltermaker’s gaze” my process is one of stops and starts. This again is obvious- but it is foundational to how one works- outside of all the other factors involved in the quiltmaking process timing is everything. Great expanses of time unfettered or a self assumed rush to complete a passage or segment of a quilt are what give us the agency to utilize our own set of principles and parameters that we use in the quiltmaking process.
Ultimately, when in the group we add the parameters of the social setting into our work- but I think for me and for many people the social parameter is too large (and too important) a variable and makes for too large and adjustment. So we must adjust our intentions and our expectations of what we can accomplish when quiltmaking in a group. I think we can gain socially from the experience- but for me ALL my quiltmaking is done “alone” whether I’m in a group or not and thus: when I quilt alone I prefer to be by myself.
