Quilted swimmers

"Swimming upstream #1" by Bonnie J Smith

How can swimmers, active in a fluid medium, be portrayed in the static medium of cloth, specifically a quilt? "Realistic" water is difficult to portray in cloth, or even by painting ... it needs a degree of abstraction, which the lines of quilting can supply, showing the flow of water. Still, there's an unease in the change of medium. A problem in catching a moment and all that's going on. How to freeze the movement, especially the movement of the water, so diffuse - transparent, even - against the solidity of the human form that is moving through it?

Floating or swimming? (via)

"Vermont Swimmers" by Catherine McConnell, now in the John Walsh collection

A gicle print of one of Tim Harding's water series (via)

Not a quilt, but a great starting point (via)

Painting from the Kizil Caves, central Asia - dating to 500 AD (via)

More questions than answers. Keep looking...