Artist Information for Heather Pregger
I work in an abstract manner, experimenting with color, line and shape in constructing geometric and freeform compositions. My work is pieced and machine quilted, using both hand dyed and commercial fabrics. I was a geology major in college and I spent many happy hours in the mineralogy lab, poring over microscopic thin sections of rocks and minerals. The colors, the shapes and the flow of colors over the face of the slides was incredibly exciting. As part of the course requirements, we sketched the thin sections we examined. Armed with a small sketchbook and a large box of colored pencils, I spent day after day drawing and coloring these slides. My abstract quilts still reference those drawings. My work is improvisational. Individual blocks are arranged and layered, the design developing with the changing interplay of colors and shapes. The emerging color/shape combinations constantly suggest new directions to pursue. Images scroll down to view allTuning Fork #1154" x 72"   The tuning fork shape is a wonderfully versatile element. I love to vary its size and value to create an impression of visual movement over the surface of the work. String Theory54" x 40"   Several years ago I attended a lecture by Stephen Hawking on String Theory. Most of it, of course, was totally over my head. But the image of strings of particles flinging out in all directions stayed with me, and inspired this quilt. Tuning Fork #22: Dark Waters48" x 64"   Dappled light shimmers across the surface of a dark forest pool. Tuning Fork #25: Magnetic Attraction40" x 40"   As children, years ago, my brother and I were given a small bottle of magnetized metal shavings. The shavings had positive and negative ends, or poles, and we loved to pour them carefully on the table, stir them around, and watch as they attracted and repelled one another. In this quilt, the two clumps of shavings are being pulled inexorably toward one other. Tuning Fork #1246" x 67"   |