After a winter break I’ve been getting back to my projects and this is one I started in Dec after a request for tall vertical pieces. The woman suggested doing a macaw and I was fortunate enough to run into a man with a macaw parrot outside a coffee shop in Cambridge. The bird was just sitting calmly on the back of a chair and didn’t mind all the admiration and picture taking a bit.

I painted the macaw on muslin including a light green background in place of the busy street scene but it didn’t provide enough contrast. So I cut the bird and tree branch and fused them onto a dark green fabric which really made the bright colors of the bird stand out.

I’m currently working adding detailed quilting to emphasize the brilliant reds, yellows and blues of the feathers. I’m finding it a little tedious and if I do another macaw parrot I will make it much larger.