Free-Form Embroidery with Judith Baker Montano

Judith Baker Montano is an award-winning and world-renowned Canadian fiber artist, photographer, author, and teacher who is recognized as the consummate expert in crazy quilting, silk ribbon embroidery, and embellishments.She grew up on the historic Bar U Ranch in Alberta, Canada. Her love of fabrics and embellishments reflects her Indian, French, and German heritage. She attributes the rich, embellished ethnic influence in her work to living between an Indian reserve and a Hutterite colony where she observed beautiful handicrafts. Living in England, Germany, and Japan for eight years was another profound influence on her artwork and outlook.Judith attended California State University, Chico, and graduated with a degree in art and journalism. Upon graduation, she painted with the San Francisco Art Guild.Experimenting with materials and her sewing machine, Judith created the Montano Center Piece Method, a copyright-protected machine method of crazy quilting.Judith was presented with the Governor General's Centennial Award of Canada in recognition for her artwork as a Canadian living abroad.She has designed for Butterick/Vogue, Bucilla Company, Mokuba Ribbons of Tokyo, Fox Hill Designs, Treenway Silks, Robert Kaufman Fabrics, Kanagawa, and Mokuba ribbons. Her work has been featured at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, Colorado; Profiles Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; The Dairy Barn, Athens, Ohio; Mitskoshi Department Show, Tokyo, Japan; Profiles and Visions, Alberta, Canada; and the La Conner Quilt Museum, La Conner, Washington.Judith has been a guest artist at countless Australian Stitches and Craft Trade shows and the Tokyo Hobby Shows. Her designs have been featured in many international and national magazines such as Better Homes and Gardens, Quilts Japan, and The Quilt Life. She has appeared on the Carol Duval Show, Simply Quilts, The Quilt Show, and Good Morning Australia. She has produced award-winning tutorial videos and DVDs.Teaching takes her throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. Classes range from clothing design, crazy quilting, embellishments, and mixed media to free-form textile art. Every year, from May to September, Judith offers eight exclusive seminars in her private studio. Visit her website, www.judithbakermontano.com, for more details.Judith resides in the small town of La Veta, Colorado, a conclave of artists, writers, and musicians. She lives in a restored 1876 cottage with her husband, Ernest Shealy, and an ever-increasing menagerie of pets.

For embroiderers ready to make the leap of faith from pillowcases with kittens stamped in blue to fiber art, Montano's newest serves as a beautiful bible. Having embroidered dancing spoons on dishtowels helps, however, because 'transforming traditional stitches into fiber art' requires knowing the basics. In the introduction, Montano, an award-winning fiber artist, author (Elegant Stitches), and teacher, encourages embroiderers to leap from traditional to free-form stitchery by describing her own journey from a frustrated little feather-stitcher to a fiber artist, honoring her influences in her account. She annotates supply lists: threads and ribbons, yarns and fabrics, hoops and tools. 'Techniques' starts with choosing background fabrics and ends with framing finished work. Montano's abundant stitch guide, a quarter of the book, ranges from A for arrowhead to W for whipstitch. The guide moves seamlessly to 'Combining Stitches,' which illustrates ways to thread trees, vines (even 'evil' ones like kudzu), and shrubs via photographs and drawings; ditto, flowers and fish. Montano marries an embroiderers' guidebook with a nature study to produce eye candy. Publishers Weekly, 10/01/12 Judith Baker Montano is the queen of hand embroidery to many quilters. Her numerous books have taught a generation about crazy quilting and embellishment, silk ribbon embroidery, and more. Her latest book merges traditional stitch techniques with a modern approach to including embroidery with contemporary quilt making. The gorgeous hand-drawn and watercolor illustrations are totally captivating in their beauty and clarity. I was surprised and impressed to discover they were created by Judith herself, who has a background in fine art and is clearly an accomplished watercolorist. This comprehensive book includes all a reader needs to know-a glossary outlining styles, supplies, and tools; a stitch guide of 60 beautifully illustrated stitches; informative chapters on utilizing stitch in projects; and more. Two notable chapters, Combining Stitches and Think Like a Painter, encourage readers to use embroidery in new and innovative ways. Judith ends with taking readers through the creation of a special project, from the first photograph to design decisions to the final product. Quilting Arts Magazine, Dec/Jan 13 The Queen of Crazy Quilting (and silk ribbon embroidery) has produced another sensational book: this one for those who enjoy stitching in a 'painterly' manner. She provides loads of instructions, guidance and advice for approaching embroidery as an art medium. You'll find a stitch dictionary of free-form stitches along with watercolour illustrations from her own journal, and tips for combining stitches to create trees, grasses, flowers and underwater shapes. There's a fascinating chapter entitled 'Think Like a Painter,' which will help you bring the pictures in your mind to fruition with needle and thread, and another in which she provides step-by-step photographs and detailed notes about the processes she used to create a textile landscape. If you're ready to be a bit adventurous with your embroidery, if you aspire to create art with stitches, buy yourself a copy of this book. It's 128 pages of inspiration. Australian Homespun Magazine, 3/5/13 Create a work of art as you translate your favorite picture of any landscape or seascape into fiber art by learning how to use artistic embroidery techniques for building layers, creating dimension and perspective, and blending shapes together cohesively. I was completely amazed by how the different stitch combinations can be used in context to create the theme you are portraying. This is the perfect guide to get you using all those threads, scraps of tulle and lace, wool, and buttons you have been saving just in case they are needed! Fabrications Quilting For You, February/March 2013