Yk quilter makes international stage
'To see your work among them was pretty amazing'
Robin Grant
Northern News Services
Tuesday, March 14, 2017
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A quilt is a many-splendoured thing.
Erin Suliak stands beside one of her quilts, which was selected to show at Quiltcon East 2017, an international juried quilt show. Suliak attended the convention in Savannah, Ga. at the end of February. Although her quilts didn't win any prizes, she said she felt honoured to be selected to attend. - photo courtesy of Erin Suliak
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Quilter Erin Suliak says she felt honoured when two of her creations were recently selected from more than 1,500 entries to display at QuiltCon East 2017, an international juried quilt show.
Although her work didn't end up winning prizes, she said the experience attending the convention in Savannah, Ga. was worth it.
"It was kind of crazy," she said. "You're walking around in awe of the prizing winning ones ... But at the same time, you're looking at someone else's whose is amazing and they haven't won a prize either but it's still up there. And to see your work among them was pretty amazing."
Quiltcon East is the largest modern quilt show of its kind and is held every year at different locations.
Of the 1,500 entries, only 350 were displayed during the four-day convention. All of them were made by members of various chapters of the Modern Quilt Guild. There were quilts made by individuals from all over the world.
The self-taught quilter said she was interested in learning more about passage quilting, which involves making quilts of the clothing of the deceased as well as materials from everyday life. The workshop she attended was led by Sherri Lynn Wood, an American modern quilter.
Passage quilts are said to be made as a bereavement process, to mark life transitions, commemorate relationships and to celebrate community.
"The workshop ended up being this combination of this therapy session as well as techniques to incorporate clothing," said Suliak. "It was also really interesting to see the power that some materials can hold."
Suliak said much of the workshop was getting past the fear of taking apart an item of clothing that holds so many memories. But beyond that, passage quilting is more than art, she said, it's a way of honouring people.
"You can make something that looks nice, but as an art form you can also create something that resonates and that can have a lot of meaning," she said.
Marilyn McGurran is co-owner of North of 60 Quilting Services. She journeyed with Suliak to the convention for professional development.
"It was awesome," she said. "It was very well run, very well organized. I learned a lot. I was very excited about the teachers who were there, and from my experience, for the quilting business that I do, it puts me miles above where I was before in terms of the work that we can now offer people."
She said it was important to attend the event because her business is looking to improve its offering of services.
"For us to be competitive with the businesses down south, we have to learn how to do what they do and on the scale that they do it," she said. "So that's why we do the travelling to these places to take the training so that we can offer the service to people here in the North."
