About five years ago, after retiring as a theatre history teacher at Capilano University, Penny Connell moved to the Sunshine Coast and right next door to a quilter.
The two struck a friendship and soon Connell was stitching up with the Moon Crazies quilt group. "I have always been interested in art," she said. "I really took to it. It's extremely rewarding."
A year later, she joined Quilters Out of Bounds, a club formed by Sunshine Coast Quilters' Guild member Judy Ross whose workshop students a decade earlier wanted to challenge textile arts.
The name - given by member Anne Dickie - fit "because we were experimenting and going on from traditional patterns, methods and materials and doing things that are out of bounds," Connell said.
They took their ideas from painters and sculptors rather than traditional quilters and often challenged themselves with an abstract theme.
Three years ago, they created a project called A Walk in the Forest, inspired by the United Nations' designated Year of the Tree. And their results are now being shown for a month at Port Coquitlam's Leigh Square Community Arts Village.
The exhibit, which has been displayed at the Sunshine Coast Quilters' Guild Show, depicts trees, leaves, roots, flowers and other greenery. The forest "is our natural environment on the Sunshine Coast. We all love it," Connell said.
Of the dozen or so members, 10 of them are exhibiting more than 60 pieces in different shapes and sizes; the main show has 22 quilts representing a hanging forest, she said.
Quilters Out of Bounds picked Leigh Square for its display after the it was recommended by Sechelt quilter Pat Crucil, who had her quilting craft at the PoCo facility last year.
Connell encourages the public to view Quilters Out of Bound's work. "We're a cutting-edge group so people interested in the textile arts would enjoy it," she said.
A Walk in the Forest can be seen until Aug. 19 at the Leigh Square Community Arts Village (located behind PoCo city hall).
