Spotlight: Lorraine Woodruff-Long, Fiber Artist

Lorraine Woodruff-Long saw the Quilts of Gees Bend and knew that is what she wanted to make. She lost her full-time career during the pandemic and decided to use her time to experiment, create, and work with a coach to develop a plan to grow her art business. Now she teaches classes and creates works across three series.

How did you get started making fiber art? Why did you choose that medium?

I grew up as a musician. I played flute and piccolo, but never thought of myself as a visual artist. I grew up sewing my own clothing. My mom taught me, but there weren’t any quilters in my family.

When my kids were growing up, I saw friends creating quilts for school fundraising projects. I thought it looked so difficult!  I looked to tutorials online and followed quilters with blogs to learn basics and realized that it was actually quite simple and satisfying. 

The Quilts of Gees Bend exhibit came to San Francisco, and it blew my mind. I was entranced by their work and realized THAT was the kind of thing I wanted to make. While I love and appreciate traditional quilt patterns, I was mesmerized by their improvisational techniques, creative color, and use of repurposed clothing.

I was working full time with two small kids and tried to find evenings and weekends to explore creating through quilts. I discovered other quilters online, found The Modern Quilt Guild, and joined my local guild, the San Francisco Quilters Guild. I was invited into a smaller local group, Bee Modern San Francisco and more recently helped start SF Sew & Sews – all with wonderful friends and quilters. I’ve found so much joy, inspiration and support from other quilters! 

When was the first time that you remember realizing that you are a creative person? 

It was a long time coming to realize I was a creative person in an artistic sense. I felt creative in providing solutions in my nonprofit work, and as a younger person as a musician when I spent more time in that world.

When I lost my full-time career position during the pandemic and had time to invest in creating and experimenting. I started to see myself as a visually creative person. Having a piece juried into the highly competitive de Young Open 2020 by the curators of a major American museum helped me see that I was creating work that was unusual and unexpected, even in the art world. 

Where do you find your inspiration for your designs?

For my Polychrome quilts I often just pull out a scrap bin and start sewing and see where my mind takes me in that moment. No plan, no image in mind. 

For my Commentary Quilt series, I find inspiration in data visualization, protest march signs and social media.  I made quilts using climate change temperature data and air quality data.  I’ve made dozens of quilts that feature text and pointedly addressing abortion/reproductive rights and gun violence that come from phrases I’ve collected from protest marches.  More recently the “meme-ification” of social media has stimulated new ideas. 

How did the pandemic impact your art?

In April 2020 I was laid off from my demanding development director job and feeling pretty down on myself and my life. I had a lot of time on my hands and filled it by quilting in my garage studio. On a whim, I submitted a quilt to The de Young Open Exhibit (the same museum where I saw the Quilts of Gees Bend 15 years earlier!) and it was accepted as one of 800 pieces of art – and only about dozen fiber artworks – from among 12,000 submissions from Bay Area artists. Additionally, my quilt, Improv Mosaic, was selected to appear in the museum’s Fine Art magazine on the exhibition.  Topping it all off, a collector contacted me and purchased my quilt – my first sale! 

I used this forced down-time to continue to create, explore, and pursue new opportunities. I took online classes from a local arts organization on how to grow your arts business practice, including seminars on communications/social media, pricing, marketing, creating a body of work, and more. 

I was fortunate to find an artist consultant/guide who awarded me a grant to work with her to develop a 3-year artist plan and to set short-, medium- and long-term goals based on what I could envision happening and how to get there. Three years later, my fiber art/quilting career has gone better than I ever really would have envisioned or hoped! 

I’ve done some adjusting along the way to take advantage of new opportunities that have arisen – including teaching and lecturing. I was invited to teach a few beginning quilting classes at SCRAP-SF, our local reuse and recycling arts center. From the popularity of those workshops, I was approached by our local community college to submit a proposal to teach quilting.  I proposed and began teaching an 11-class Basic Improv Quilting series at City College of San Francisco Extension in Fall 2023. The series sold out the first session! I was invited to continue the series and more in Spring, Summer and Fall of 2024 and have added other classes as well. Teaching has been pure joy and a highlight of my creative life! I’ve subsequently developed curriculum for various workshops that I teach at guilds and shops. My goal is to develop more on-demand and zoom classes and to continue to teach in person locally and wherever teaching will send me. 

I am still a nonprofit consultant part time, but the rest of my time I’m working as a Fiber/Quilt Artists and teacher. I love this time in my life and am so grateful I’m able to do this. 

Do you do series work? How does that affect your approach?

Yes.  My work falls into three creative groups. Within each I’ve created specific subseries.

• Polychrome: Intense use of color, contrasting hues and values and improvisational piecing. Subseries include Improv Mosaic and Silk Improv.
• Commentary: Quilts with a message on issues that matter most to me. Subseries include Women’s Work, Climate Change and Gun Violence.
• Reimagined: Repurposed clothing, mostly men’s shirting and denim. Currently working on a series titled “7×7” – Seven quilts each made from seven shirts.

Does your work have stories to tell?

My Commentary Quilts each has a story to tell. The quilts using text are often self-explanatory, but some of my climate change quilts that were created as data visualization often require an artist statement to better help tell the story. These usually have a detailed legend on the back. 

My Reimagined quilts all have a story – where the clothing came from, what was the inspiration, etc. Usually from my own family. 

Polychrome has primarily been about a simple viewer experience in immersive. 

When it comes to creating, are you more of a planner or an improviser?

I’m generally more of an improviser than a planner – especially for my Polychrome and Reimagined work. I typically don’t know what a project will look like at the end when I start something within that category. I love the process of figuring it out and letting the process unfold, inspire and develop.  

Are you a “finisher”? How many UFOs do you think you have?

I’m mostly a finisher, but sometimes I get stuck creatively or technically and have to put something aside to figure out later. I had many unsolved problem UFOs prior to the pandemic. I used that down time to pull out those problem UFOs and retackle them.  Some have become my favorite quilts! Right now, I only have a couple of UFOs, but have a very long list of projects and ideas on my list I want to make. More Commentary Quilts and so many ideas for Polychrome and Repurposed. 

Do you have a dedicated space for creating? If so, what does it look like?

I sew in my unfinished garage in our circa 1922 San Francisco bungalow alongside a parked car. I’ve carved out sections that are mine for a design wall, cutting and sewing tables, fabric storage, long-arm, iron, tools, etc. I usually sew with the garage door open to give me more light and air, and put up a gate for my little dog, Pearl, to stay inside.

I love sewing here and would never want to have a studio offsite somewhere. I’ve met so many of my neighbors walking their dogs who look inside and ask about what’s on my design wall. The weather is moderate year around, so it’s rarely too cold  (certainly never too hot) for the door to be open. It’s not a beautiful space in any way! No lovely shelves of fabric or anything – but lots of room to move around (when I move the car out!)

My favorite part is that I can make a mess and leave it all downstairs. It’s easy to access. I don’t have to leave my home.  

Scraps. Saver? Or be done with them?

I keep most pieces that can be resewn with a ¼” seam, as small as ¾”-1” pieces and strips, and use it. I love using tiny pieces to make scrap quilts. I have a giant scrap bin of just my Kona cotton solids that I draw from for my Polychrome quilts.  I also bring giant handfuls from this bin to share with classes that I teach. I have plenty to share!

How often do you start a new project? Do you work actively on more than one project at a time?

I start a new project about every couple of weeks. I try to keep going until I finish a piece. I actively work on more than one project at a time. Often, I’ll have a Polychrome piece going while I work on a Commentary Quilt and then do work on a Repurposed project. 

Can you tell us about the inspiration and process of one of your works? How does a new work come about?

One of my favorite and most popular pieces is a quilt titled Quilt Melt. I made it in 2017 when I was working long hours full time, and really used my creative time to relax and find creative solace.

I was inspired by the work of, Faig Ahmed, an Azerbaijani artist who creates “conceptual works utilizing traditional decorative craft of carpets into contemporary sculptural works of art. His works reimagine ancient craft and create new visual boundaries by deconstructing traditions and stereotypes.” He is best known for hist fantastical woven pieces based on the classical Azerbaijani carpet, which is a cornerstone of the artist’s cultural heritage.

I fell in love with Doubts. I loved how he took a beautiful and traditional, and familiar cultural image and blew it up in such an unexpected way. I felt traditional half-square triangle quilt block was a similar “expected” image and wanted to see it evolve, change and drip.

Any viewer would look at it and know that the quilt “should” be filled with traditional blocks and be jarred by the unexpected dripping. It reminded me of what was happening with climate change and the melting of the ice caps, and I created a piece that was my first commentary quilt on climate change. It was selected for my first SAQA show and was blown up into a two-story sign that hung off the side of the California Heritage Museum. It’s been in the most shows and museums of anything I’ve created, including my first piece to be shown at the International Quilt Festival in Houston. I have plans to make more in the series using the “expected” look of the traditional quilt block that transforms into other forms. 

The challenge is giving myself space, or in some case time, to walk away and ponder it. 

My least favorite part is getting the piece ready and loaded to quilt. Even with a longarm, which makes it so much easier, it still feels like such a physically demanding slog. Once I get going and everything is working technically, it feels satisfying and fun. It’s a delight pulling off a quilt from the longarm, all done! 

How has your creativity evolved over the years? What triggered the evolution to new media/kinds of work/ways of working?

For most of my life, especially as a younger person, I thought of my creative self only as a musician. When I no longer spent so much time playing, I lost my abilities and felt unmotivated when I could no longer play pieces that used to come so easily. My creative energy was put into my job, my family. I made great birthday parties for my kids! Terrific cakes! Wonderful Halloween costumes!)

More recently, I have evolved to believing myself a visually creative person. I just didn’t see myself that way for most of my life. Having the gift of more time, and being able to just create, create, create, has triggered my ability to explore new series, ideas, etc. ( I wonder, have I hit the magical 10,000 hours yet?) I’ve been blessed to have so many wonderful friends, family and supporters to encourage me and spur me on. 

What do you do to keep yourself motivated and interested in your work? 

I could create 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To date, I haven’t had any problem getting motivated. I have more ideas than I can create in my lifetime.

The challenge for me is being organized to manage my nonprofit consulting work with all aspects of my creative business. In addition to creating new work, there is the time intensive work for the “business” of art (my database, newsletters, entering shows, social media, arranging speaking).

I also teach and must set aside time for prepping for teaching, classes, and engagements, as well as creating and making new teaching curriculum. My goal is to have on-demand and zoom classes available on my website by the end of the year. I’m pretty organized, but each area takes a lot of time, and cuts into time simply pondering, creating, making and exploring. 

Do you enter juried shows? Do you approach your work differently for these venues?

Yes, I often enter my work in juried shows. I tend to create work that motivates me. If I find an exhibit that has a theme for a piece that I’ve already created, I’ll submit it. I’ve actually found a great deal of success doing this, probably because I have a variety of work with various themes. I don’t’ do just “one thing”. I rarely create work specifically to enter into a juried show, but have on only two occasions. In both instances, my work was selected. Mostly, I create what I want and find places where it fits after the fact. 

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received?

Create what YOU love, what YOU like! 

Where can people see your work?

My website: QuiltingintheFog.com and Instagram @quiltinginthefog. From both places you can subscribe to my monthly newsletter where I share where my work is showing, work that is in progress and upcoming teaching/classes.  I participate in San Francisco Open Studios each Fall, where visitors can see my studio and work here in San Francisco. 

Interview posted September 2024