The Lobster Quadrille

A type of square dance, the Quadrille is composed of four dances where all of the sea creatures (excluding the jellyfish) pair up with a lobster, move toward the shoreline and fling the lobsters out into the sea. (Mr. Carroll had quite the imagination!) As for meaning, the best I could find was that since lobsters are considered prey while the other creatures are most likely the predators, they toss the lobsters far into the sea to likely avoid being caught themselves. The dance itself is demonstrated by the mock turtle and the Gryphon. The entire poem composed by Lewis Carroll can be found in chapter 10 and adds a lot of detail I was unable to include here.

Using one of my marbled fabrics as the watery background, I composed the lobster from a beatuiful batik over-printed with a lovely gold pattern. The necktie is also a batik. Novelty fabrics, yarn and beads were also used. Full view Detail views: Detail 1 –  background, antennae, lettering, quilting and beads  Detail 2 – quilting