Line - A Critical Design Element in Quilting

Zen View Red

23" x 34" - Cotton and silk

June Underwood

"The Line as Quilted" – June Underwood - “Line is important in design, particularly, of course, in drawing. It moves the eye, evokes feelings, defines or suggests shape, can make value and depth, and can be varied to vary its expressive quality. In quilted art, line functions in all these ways, but can have a weight and value different from that found in drawing and is far more important than line is in painting.” Thus begins an incisive article by June Underwood recently posted to the Art & Perception blog.

June's essay is a profound and an in-depth exploration and analysis of the use of line in quilting and explores the power of this seemingly simply design element. Many pictures (such as "Zen View Red" shown above) are used to illustrate each point. An extensive and excellent discussion follows in the comment section.
http://www.artandperception.com/2007/09/the-line-as-quilted.html

To view more of June's work, visit her website:
http://www.juneunderwood.com

June also is the founder of the Ragged Cloth Cafe,
a mailing list for artists
"...to verbally circle ideas about their own work, the visual arts,
and the theories, histories, definitions and philosophies of arts
while relating these to the textile arts..." and of its spinoff blog,
Ragged Cloth Cafe, Serving Art and Textiles
which hosts "Discussions and ideas about art and textile art"
from many different contributors.

"The Quilted Line": Pam RuBert posted an essay to her blog discussing her use of line in her most recent work, "The Food Pyramid: Another Mystery of the Not-So-Ancient World"
http://pamdora.com/blog/2007/10/01/the-quilted-line/

To view Pam's work, visit her website:

http://pamrubert.com/

"The Line in Quilting": - Kim Ritter has posted an extensive essay (including exercises) about the use of line in quilting based on notes from her City and Guilds classwork
http://www.kimritter.com/weblog/?p=163

To view Kim's work, visit her website:

http://www.kimritter.com/

Create a Line Sampler – This is an exercise designed to investigate the expressive nature of a simple line
http://www.brigantine.atlnet.org/GigapaletteGALLERY/websites/ARTiculationFinal/PDFfiles/CreateALineSampler.pdf

The Elements of Art: Line – Illustrates how Line is used expressively by artists
http://www.brigantine.atlnet.org/GigapaletteGALLERY/websites/ARTiculationFinal/MainPages/LineMain.htm

ArtsWork - This is a series of 6 excellent exercises for experimenting with Line http://artswork.asu.edu/arts/students/line/index.htm