Quilt Art the beauty of Freehand Sewing

Floyd L. Brandt
Posted 5/4/18

Turning a piece of fabric this way, then that way, with a clacking noise filling the air, Milla Malchow takes care not to get her fingers under the needle of the machine she is using to create beautiful Quilt Art.

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Quilt Art the beauty of Freehand Sewing

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FORT LARAMIE - Turning a piece of fabric this way, then that way, with a clacking noise filling the air, Milla Malchow takes care not to get her fingers under the needle of the machine she is using to create beautiful Quilt Art. 

When she has finished, the art she has created may be an animal, person or a scene. And, with a stitch here and there, she puts the finishing touches on the portrait she is working on bringing it to life.

Milla, who was born in Russia, finished high school at age 16, then began to collect college degrees, which she acquired while living in the town of Kazan, Russia. Her degrees include a Medical degree, Financial degree, Master’s Degree in Law and Master’s degree in Construction, each taking four to five years to complete.

Milla moved to Alaska, where she met her husband Bill Malchow to begin a new life. Living in Eagle River, Alaska ,close to where Bill worked as an Air Traffic Controller, the two were ready to move to where there was more sunshine and less winter. When Bill retired they bought land near Fort Laramie and built a house, giving Milla a place to practice her creative art projects.

Working on their house for the past four years is Bill’s art project, Milla said. Unique, one-of-a-kind railings in the upstairs and the acid wash concrete floor downstairs gives Milla’s art room an identity of its own. 

“He has great golden hands,” Milla said of her husband. 

They enjoy life in their home watching wildlife running across their land and looking out to see the vastness of the land. In many ways, it is like living in the bush of Alaska. 

“But we can drive places,” Bill said “Go to the store and shop.”

Working with many different types of expressional arts, Milla finally found Art Quilting in 2015. Her interests were sparked from the few classes that she found on the internet, where she learned to make designs. But she craved to know and learn more about the art form.

When her husband Bill bought her a new sewing machine, she had only sewn clothing and a few regular quilting squares but had not sewn Art Quilts yet. The technique was confusing at first, not knowing the types of fabric she needed or that she would need hundreds of different colors and types of threads. 

Milla tried to find people that knew how to do the technique so she could ask questions and get help. 

“There are not many people around that I could find who could teach this craft,” she said. “I tried to find classes but could not find any. Then I found an online class with the Silky Company who had a certified teacher. It was not Art Quilting but how to make regular quilts.” The class helped Milla to get started with the first steps. While she liked what she had done, it still was not what she wanted. So, Milla began teaching herself, starting slow and learning the craft by trial and error. 

Milla found books on how to do the Quilting, but because of the poor internet connection at the couple’s remote Goshen County home, she was very limited to how she could learn, not being able use the web and the videos they offered. Without any internet, no video to watch, she could only use books to learn. 

 “She learned some techniques online and then practiced and developed her own method using some of those techniques,” Bill said.

With containers of thread and fabric stacked in her studio, Milla said just collecting the materials to create the art can be time consuming. Selecting the background fabric first, she searches for a complimentary fabric, which acts as a frame and helps the art work to come to life. 

“It looks more like finished art with the right boarder around it,” she explained.   

The thread is even more important, mixing and matching the colors and shades that with every move on the sewing machine will form the subject Milla is creating. It is like watching a painter or sculptor form and shape the unique design of an animal or the face of a man or woman, or even the form of a child’s face and body. But more important, the color of the thread gives the picture contrast, shading and depth. With more than 1,000 different hues of colored thread, Milla’s pallet grows every time she goes to town. 

“Sometimes I use more than 200 different shades of colors to do one piece.” Milla said. “We are so far from any store and when I start a project I need the fabric and I cannot just stop and run into town. They may not have many choices. So, I keep fabric on the shelves for my projects.”

The creative process for completion can range from three to six weeks, depending the size and difficulty. Working every day for as much as 10 hours a day, Milla first draws the idea on paper. She assembles the pattern, first putting the background together with the fabric, then creating
the scene. 

As she works, there is a reason for each and every stitch, she said. They form the subject, using up to 350,000 or more stitches to complete a piece. 

 “She works six days a week then we go do something, go shopping,” Bill said. “At first it was a hobby and now has turned into
much more.” 

“If you want it more like art, then you cannot make the stitches flat,” Milla said. Building up the stitches, in the way a painter layers each stroke of their brush, will give the picture depth. Rounding the cheeks and under the eyes of a portrait or the mouth and nose of the animals gives it life. 

“Look at the nose,” Milla said, pointing out the stitching around the eye of a portrait quilt. “You see the nose looks like a real nose, not like a flat one. We go this direction and that direction. It looks like more natural.”

Her method to create the quilted art is called freehand quilting, moving the fabric in many different directions creating continues stitching building the picture with hundreds of colors to bring it to life.

Selling her freehand art quilts has yet to become part of the Malchows plan. But they are working on the value of each piece. They had to find somebody that could appraise the work. Traveling to Longmont, Colo., speaking with the only person qualified to appraise Milla’s work, led to a price, based on a piece-by-piece value. 

Like most artwork her work cannot be copied. Each piece is unique to itself and could be considered a masterpiece. 

In November last year, the Malchows went to Houston, Texas, for a solo exhibition featuring her first 15 pieces. The show was a success, she said, and since she has been contacted by people in New York and Chicago wanting to buy some of her art work. 

Also, after the show she was contacted by people who want her to exhibit the Quilt Art in more shows. But the cost of each show is holding the couple back. Without a sponsor to cover the cost it will be difficult to attend the shows when each entry can cost upwards of $2,000 to $4,000 dollars per show, they are looking for a sponsor or sponsors that will help with the cost of the shows.

Even with this set back, Milla can be found in her studio creating the beautiful panels of Quilting Art. Her art work had been hanging at Edward Jones on Main Street in Torrington. Maybe she will be showing again locally, showing Bills favorite piece the Turtle Guide, a man herding turtles.