Turid Toennessen won Aurifil prize. during European Patchwork Meeting 2008 with her “Silver Birds”. Turid : “Some ten years ago when I moved to the south-east part of Norway I started to take my quilting in a new direction. By coincidence I met with quilters who dyed and printed their fabric before quilting.
As young I had been to art school learning to do silk printing. Technic and equipment had surely developed over the 45 years I had been away from it. But the way was rather short back.
I usually start a new work by dying my fabric in a rather free way, and then look to what the fabric tells me. As I go on, I put on other fabrics and materials, or I sew together a patch, to be the topping of the quilt. Quite often I transfer photo on to silk printing frames, and repeat the theme in different angels and shades.
My quilting is rather heavily since the applied fabrics mostly have raw edges. Therefore heavily quilting is necessary to stick the application to the back fabric. Quite often the quiltline underlines and emphasize the printed theme. I also find that a heavily quilted top gives a pleasant and smooth presentation. Besides giving the quilt a smooth presentation, heavily quilting adds that special dimension to the quilt giving it soul and makes it unique.
Most of my 67 years I have lived by the sea. My whole me is influenced by that.