Green quilt drawing

If you have been following the progress of my "Good to be Green" quilt, you will know that this is my final, full-sized drawing, from which I will work. This is probably the hardest part, finished.

If you look back at the previous versions you should be able to see some changes here. First, someone pointed out that she needed pockets, which led me to the conclusion that what she needed was really a pair of fairly traditional overalls. You can probably see that I actually cut out the area where the old drawing of her clothes was and taped in a new section with the details of her overalls. You can probably see that I also spent some time working on the lilies and the leaves and adding more flowers to the background. Now the fun part of choosing the fabrics and colors will begin.

I just wrote a message to the QuiltArt list responding to a post about the need to constantly hone our skills. I agreed and stated my opinion that it is so important for artists to learn to draw and to keep drawing. This sometimes gets me in trouble because a few of the people on that list seem to believe that art should spring from one's heart or soul, without the corrupting influences of any kind of practice or training! But I disagree. If you do representational work, as I do, drawing well is an important skill, but even for people doing abstract work, the practice of drawing is brain training for seeing and understanding visual relationships and pattern and balance and all those things that go into art. Drawing is hard work and it remains hard work even as you get better at it, at least it does for me. But it is certainly satisfying when you feel like you've captured something on paper, because you feel like you have gained an understanding of the thing.