Quilted Painting #1

Quilted Painting #1
© 2008 Mark Patro
11 " x 12"

Equality = Mutual Respect

To start the weekend off I've decided to "play" with an idea from sketches in my notebook. The first image was literally a "doodle" while watching campaign TV...at this point TIRESOME campaign TV. This sketch was made the day after Barak Obama's speech on racism in America. Consequently "Equality" was on my mind. This is the first sketch:

After thinking about this concept for a few days while working on other things, I thought about how the colors and patterns might affect the message it presents.

Since "Gay Marriage" (o.k., o.k.)....Same-Sex Marriage (don't want to leave any one out) has been on my mind in an art-work kind of way recently. The colors in the Gay Pride flag just banged me on my head when I visited the People's Place Quilt Museum in Intercourse, Pennsylvania. (An amazing place if you are at all interested in sewing, Fabric or quilts.) The display in their window was a delightful moment.


This is their web site if you are interested:
http://www.ppquiltmuseum.com/

Anyway, I bought a few fat quarters of the window-displayed group of fabrics. It was so handy of them to put all the colors in one prepackaged group!

Bringing them home motivated another drawing in my sketch book:
As you can see I have decided to make this piece more about Marriage and Equality than simply about Gay Marriage.

Equality here is the primary emphasis behind the meaning of this work.

Men Get Nervous When Boys Wear Skirts

Men Get Nervous When Boys Wear Skirts
© 2008 Mark Patro
5 1/4 " x 5 1/2"


This is the today's experiment. The image is a computer-assembled collage printed from an ink jet printer onto cotton fabric, and quilted with a cotton batting and trimmed in gold thread.

Some Progress on "Size Queen"

This is the today's state of my current quilting project. As previously stated here the final quilt will be 8 ft wide by 12 feet long. This is the first ten square feet... from the top left. I need to finish the top two rows this weekend the remaining six panels are in pieces on the dining room table. I'm off to sew.

The Other Side of Leviticus

The Other Side of Leviticus
© 2008 Mark Patro
12"x15"

This piece answers, to some degree, the question ending my previous post: "Just why is one type of relationship valid and others are not?" This is the finished version, arrived at after a few revisions.

Anyway...

There is the disapproving religious point of view, and there is the uplifting LGBT point of view, which comes from living in a positive relationship. (The uplifting religious point of view which supports long term same-sex relationships is seldom heard.) The disapproving point of view is based on a Bible passage from Leviticus and gets most media time. The Biblical bigotry which that passage causes results in either direct or indirect violence...and recently mean-spirited denial of civil equality. This mean spirited energy is directed at gay men and lesbians in many ways.

This quilted-painted-collaged image, The Other Side of Leviticus is my personal response to how joyful a Long Term Relationship can be and how ugly and hurtful and depriving religious-motivated bigotry is in the real world. They (read it as the government or the community) want my tax money but refuse to see me as an equal citizen.

I hope this piece brings this to the attention of those who see it.

Marriage is....

Marriage is SO gay
© 2007 Mark Patro
14"x14"

Same-sex marriage has been a politically charged issue for some time now. And the controversy over this issue has stimulated my creative brain of late.

I must admit I do not have these ideas completely worked out yet. So, this piece, a work-in-progress has gone through several conceptual changes. The form this iteration has sifted out to, is that of a ring-bearer's pillow.

The title is a play on the words, an overly-used middle school cliche...(purposely intended to imply the sophomoric tone of this polarized political argument.) Just why is one type of relationship valid and others are not?

Artist's Statement

As an artist I feel compelled to make images that reflect my personal beliefs as well as those of our cultural collective. How these polarities collide in a symbiotic dance is of most interest to me.

In my recent work I have traded the paint brush and paint for a sewing machine and thread. Moving away from traditional studio media such as pencil, crayon, scissors and glue, I now use the digital camera, computer-based drawing and digital imagery as my preferred tools of assembly. This use of current technology has enabled a nuanced approach to my personal preference of making art that is a building process alluding to a residual past.

I believe metaphorically that to get to the essence of my work I had to chip away the excess, the baggage if you will, with a subtractive approach not unlike a sculptor revealing a spirit from within a stone. This shift in my art making process has allowed me to “clean the slate” and create a surface of positive building blocks, not only purposeful and constructive, but personal as well.

Incorporated in my current work are photographic images, symmetrical and geometric designs deriving from thirty years of engineering drafting experience and an intuitive desire to juxtapose colored fabric patterns to create a visual narrative. This work takes form from the age old practice of traditional quilt making. Quilting not only satisfies my innate need for mathematical order and personal ideation, but attempts to assuage the tensions that exists within our society and its’ cultural values. An example of this conceptualized tension is illustrated in my first quilt, Man-sized Girly Quilt. This work exposes the tension between pink fabric and bare-chested voluptuous cowboys. The manly imagery of cowboydom is not associated with the personal comfort of “blankey,” not of course, unless you are a gay man. The allusion to things gay is indicated by the color scheme and the corners filled with purple pansies. My method of assembly, sewing, purposely emphasizes gender role stereotypes because it is traditionally thought of as a female activity. For me, these tensions fuel my work and provide a passive/aggressive balance of concepts, which I hope will resonate with the viewer.

This Past Weekend

This past weekend I sequestered myself and worked most of Saturday and Sunday on my current quilt: "Size Queen." This name came in response to how many times I heard, "Wow! its so big," while showing my first quilt to anyone interested. Attached is an image of my work-area... my (dining room) studio.

I am aiming to complete this quilt by early May 2008.

The final quilt will measure: 96"x144"

Martyred Milk

Martyred Milk
© 2007 Mark Patro
36"x36"

This quilt is dedicated to the memory of Harvey Milk, the first elected openly gay political figure in the United states. My effort here was to contrast the violence of his death with colors and frill which represent his life and sexual orientation.

This quilt is the assembly of a digitally printed image on fabric in combination with paint and a hole burned with a soldering iron, and them trimmed with curtain frill.

Man-Sized Girly Quilt

Man-Sized Girly Quilt
© 2007 Mark Patro
approx. 90"x114"


In July 2007 on a restless summer day, I decided to buy a new sewing machine having given the old one away. My goal was to make some curtains for my kitchen.



South West Quilt
2007 Karen Brehm


After my friend Karen won a ribbon at both the Howard County Fair and then a Blue Ribbon for "First Quilt" at the Maryland State Fair, I went to see the "Gees Bend" quilt exhibit at the Walter's Art Museum in Baltimore. It was during this visit that I decided to try my hand at quilting.

This adventure took me to a wide array of fabric sources and turned into discovering the brilliantly colored fabrics of Kaffee Fassett, a British fiber artist and fabric pattern designer. Shortly thereafter I discovered the cowboy fabric designed by Alexander Henry.

My training as a painter along with my interest in the human figure merged at this point and my work on this quilt began. Encouraged by one of my painting instructors, my work continued in the image-on-quilt direction.

There will be more...