The Quilting Retreats at Park House
Quilter, artist, Voice reader – Sandy Small Proudfoot
Sandy, who lives in Canada, recently got in touch with us at the Voice, sharing her connection to Arran. She first came to the island in the 1990s, through the late Jean Holmes and her sisters, Jessie and Mary, who grew up on Arran when their minister father was assigned to a church here. Sandy’s first tour was extensive – they covered the whole island and she fell in love with Arran on that visit.
She has many wonderful memories: “To drive along the coastal road and the road over the ‘mountain’ in the southern part of the island and meet sheep just wandering along the road was so special. I was truly fortunate to have discovered Arran, thanks to Jean Holmes and Jessie Wilson.”
Later, Jean sent information to Sandy about Judy McAllister’s quilting retreats at Park House in Corriecravie. As a quilting instructor in Toronto, and graduate of design from Ontario College of Art, it was arranged that Sandy would come to teach, and during the 1990s she came twice to facilitate a week’s workshop at The Piggery, behind Park House.
Sandy remembers the retreats: “The students came from all over and frequently brought husbands with them so mealtimes were lots of fun learning where people were from and sharing our time together however briefly. I remember both Judy and Ken McAllister so well. Judy never stopped cooking up a storm in the kitchen, Ken did the serving and what a charming gentleman he was, made the visit such fun.”
She also met the local shepherd, Charlie, and his wife Jane, who had a farm on the coast road, on the way to Sliddery. “One day I accompanied Charlie in his delivery of twin lambs near the water’s edge. I returned to Park House covered in blood on my dripping raincoat for it had been raining early that morning and I remember Ken McAllister saying, ‘You can’t come in here looking like that!’ It was said in humour but there was no way I was going in the house covered in all that muck and I was directed to the laundry room attached to the back of the house, to clean up! Judy and Ken have since passed away but my teaching weeks at Park House were the highlight of my teaching quilting.”
Sandy has had an extensive and successful career as a quilter. In 1983, she began as a part-time mature student at Ontario College of Art in Toronto and obtained a diploma in design. Since then her work has travelled in exhibits in Canada, the US and in England, winning awards and featuring in magazines as well. See her website for more information and details of her work.
Sandy continues quilting, and although she says “my hands are starting to give out with age, I hope to keep on creating my textile pieces for as long as I possibly can.”
The two quilts featured here are her most recent creations. One is the Climate Change wall quilt, featuring the animals threatened now in Canada by climate change. The other is the Coercive Control quilt, which focuses on Domestic Violence, and trying to bring Canada’s attention to the issue of Domestic Violence and Coercive Control.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
CLIMATE CHANGE
When the world is burning up, when horrific hurricanes, pandemics, murders envelope the world, animals on endangered species lists, the New Testament and Revelations comes to mind. Metis artist, Christi Belcourt’s beautiful painting, “Offerings to Save the World, inspired me to create my own sparkling waters falling onto our endangered Canadian wildlife… polar bears, musk oxen, caribou, arctic fox, pikas, ivory gulls, ringed seals, whooping cranes, sockeye salmon, monarch butterfly. The Four Horses of Apocalypse alongside the painting by John Brown Abercrombie (1843-1929) of a cemetery represents Revelations. The red border symbolizes the flaming fires of eternity.
Sandra Small Proudfoot (c) design Jan. 2022, Mono, Ontario, Canada
Machine quilted: Mary Light
Size: 36” Wide by 100” Long
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IS A VERY SERIOUS ISSUE IN SOCIETY TODAY.
Coercive Control is a term used in Intimate Partner Relationships where abusive behaviours lead to Domestic Violence. From my experience, I hope to put a visual face to this tragic issue of victims of abuse. Representing a loving relationship, peaceful meadows, sky above and trees surround and embrace Botticelli’s ‘Birth of Venus’ standing before my chicken house in the country. Yet, when that relationship breaks down and becomes abusive, we are vulnerable; our ’emotional’ eggs have been placed in our loved one’s basket. Clouds gather and darken as they fall through a formerly loving relationship onto Bernini’s sculpture ‘The Ecstasy of Santa Teresa’. A winged Angel, his spear filled with Divine Love, is thrust into the heart of the nun lying beneath him. Yet, to me, this sculpture also spoke of betrayal. The angel’s duplicitous smile, his sharpened spear reminded me of domestic violence and the heartbreak associated with it. Domestic Violence places victims in a cage of emotional, financial and often physical abuse; fearfully exposed to another’s anger and control. Shelter is needed. But then, one day on a leafy branch a tiny green crysallis appears and from this a beautiful new butterfly is born. Recovery is possible. A new life begins.
Original design (c) 2022 Sandra Small Proudfoot, AOCA ’89, Mono, Ontario, Canada
This image is available in poster form as well. Please contact me at farmerswalkbandb@sympatico.ca subject head: Coercive Control Poster
“My textile work is a way for me to bring to the general public a visual image of Domestic Violence and Intimate Partner Control. This link will explain it further. I commend the UK for taking the lead in this issue. I hope my work may put a visual `face` to domestic violence and what it feels like to victims who might relate to the textile piece.”
With many thanks to Sandy for sharing her memories of Arran and her beautiful work with us at the Voice!
