Last week we had the opportunity to visit the European Patchwork Meeting (EPM) in France, we want to tell you something about this incredible experience! 

Let’s see together the most relevant aspects of this event:

OLD AND NEW FRIENDS

It was a great occasion to meet Quilt Improv studio’s friends and to know new people from around the world. We could see in person Maria Paz Avalos, a participant of our games from Chile, and to see her quilts made for Chile Quilting exhibit! It was a pleasure to meet her after two years of social media contacts.
We rejoiced with Mattea Jurin when her work “Big girls don’t cry”, selected for the EPM international challenge Once Upon a Thread, was announced to have won a prize and a blue ribbon during the award ceremony!
We shared fun and shopping time with Pamela Nensi, another quilter who participated to Quilt Improv Studio games in the past, and we selected some nice gifts for our friend Carla @falcolupo! We met many other people we knew, while walking between exhibits.

Giovanna, Maria Paz, Paola

rejoicing with Mattea Jurin for her awarded quilt

Pamela, Paola, Giovanna

ARTISTS

We met Cecilia Koppmann, an outstanding Argentine author of quilts made with colors typical of her culture: an incredible use of black combined with bright and intense colors, and with expressive variations of value!
We had a lovely chat with Carolina Oneto, talking about our common love for solids and discussing strategies to fill our stash with several types of colored fabric.
We could admire the real colors of quilts  we saw only in books or on the web, such as the improv works by Cindy Grisdela, and we expressed her our admiration for her amazing free motion quilting skill!

Giovanna, Cecilia, Paola

Paola, Carolina, Giovanna

Cindy, Paola

QUILTS (obviously)

More than 30 exhibitions of international artists, more than 1000 works of art, you can find traditional, contemporary, modern, improvised art, fiber art or whatever can be made with fabrics and thread, and you sure find something that you love.
We, Giovanna and Paola, being SAQA members, volunteered welcoming guests at the Wide Horizons stand, since we had two quilts made by us in the show. This was a wonderful opportunity to talk about techniques and quilts in the show with visitors from several countries, such that we often had to switch language, rehearsing quilting terms used in different idioms.

Giovanna, Paola, SAQA stand

Giovanna, “Chaos”

Paola, “East”

ALSACE

Only few words to describe this French region: it seems to live in a dream, surrounded by fairy tale houses made of gingerbread!

This has been a new and eye-opening experience. Now we are full of ideas for our next improv projects. We hope that such events are inspiring also for you!

Alsace

Colmar

val d’Argent