Photos by hailey hoffman/The astorian
TOP: Hutchings at her gallery. LEFT: Hutchings’ ‘Don’s City’ is based off a painting by
Don Knapp.
Continued from Page 4
She changed her focus once her children
were grown.
Hutching’s pieces are largely inspired
by photos, she said. Hutchings finds
inspiration from stock photos on the
internet, photos her friends take and
send to her and images she captures
with her camera.
“My pieces are often a simplified
version of whatever the photo was,” she
said.
One of Hutching’s favorite pieces
she’s created is known as “Don’s City.”
Measuring 59 inches by 59 inches, the
wall quilt is made from hand-painted
fabrics based on a painting by her long-
time friend, Don Knapp. Hutchings said
she has translated many of his paintings
to fabric pieces over the years.
Once Hutchings has found a photo
that has inspired a fabric piece, she’ll
blow the photo up and work with that
rather than sketching an outline to fol-
low. From there, she weaves together
fabrics with a mixture of shapes and
patterns to mimic the photo she is work-
ing from. Often, these pieces become
quilts.
Hutchings paints the fabric she uses
in her projects. She decided to paint fab-
ric because she couldn’t always find
commercial fabric that fit her vision for
her projects.
“I’ll use fabric paints and mus-
lin, white muslin, so I’m starting with
a good, solid background,” Hutchings
said. “It’s a watercolor technique. The
fabric paints can be diluted just like
watercolors and you work wet-on-wet
just like a watercolor would too.”
By combining commercial fabrics
with her own creations, Hutchings has a
wide range of patterns to work with.
Since fabric art is a rare trade, she
said she has learned skills from online
classes given by other fabric artists.
“There are a lot of excellent fab-
ric artists out there who teach classes
so I’ve taken a bunch of those,” Hutch-
ings said. “In the fabric world, (the skill)
almost has to be self-taught since there
is no degree in fabric art.”
Thursday, March 25, 2021 // 5