“Life’s a Beach”
Laura McCabe
Fountain Hills, AZ
13″ x 10″
“Having grown up in Gig Harbor, Washington, I was very inspired by this particular challenge. As a child I was always at the beach in the summer with my two brothers. We would go to different Washington beaches and explore the washed-up sea life, and build sandcastles and driftwood forts. When putting my piece together I wanted to convey my memories of the beach in the form of a paper quilt. I used machine zigzag stitches to outline each separate square that I cut out from different sand-colored scrapbook papers, highlighting with things that represent the beach to me: watercolors, stamps, sand, rocks and seashells from my childhood, flowers, a vintage transparency, and a feather. I painted a beach scene above the ‘sand quilt’ using watercolors and gesso. I also added some freeform stitching to my piece to add texture and interest, in keeping with the quilt theme, and included two small pictures of my brothers and me enjoying a day in Port Townsend, Washington. The border is enhanced with a poem written in pencil:
‘Boys finding seashells, girls sifting sand, friends building castles, as high as they can. I stretch my arms out far as they’ll reach. Oh my, what fun, on this day at the beach!’
– Unknown
I felt the poem represented ‘Life’s a Beach,’ and corresponded with the pictures and ephemera, wrapping the whole piece together beautifully.”
See more art from our “Life’s a Beach” Reader Challenge in the July/August issue.