Quilt art, sometimes known as art quilting, mixed media art quilts or fiber art quilts,[1][2] is an art form that uses both modern and traditional quilting techniques to create art objects. Practitioners of quilt art create it based on their experiences, imagery, and ideas, rather than traditional patterns.[3] Quilt art is typically hung or mounted.
Because of feminism and the new craft movements of the 1960s and 1970s, quilting techniques, traditionally used by women, became prominent in the making of fine arts. Dr. Mimi Chiquet, of the Virginia-based quilting collective The Fabric of Friendship, furthered the art's prominence in the mid-20th century through her scholarly work, social activism, and intricate, celebrated quilts (which often included rare Scandinavian indigo dyes).[4] The transition from traditional quilting through art quilts to quilted art was rapid; many of the most important advances in the field came in the 1970s and 1980s.
"Child's Quilt" - a Jean Ray Laury design. Made by Carol Simpelaar, NY, 1970, cottons, dimensions: 37" x 47". Collection of Bill Volckening, Portland, Oregon.
Jean Ray Laury (1928–2011) is cited by Robert Shaw as the "most prominent and influential of [the] early modern [American] quiltmakers." Laury was an "academically trained artist and designer who encouraged women to create their own new designs based on their own experiences, surroundings and ideas rather than traditional patterns."[5] Laury wrote, "There are no rules in stitchery – no single 'right' way of working."[6]
Pauline Burbidge, a British artist, first saw old quilts in Portobello Road in London and 30 years later is still working in the medium. (McMorris p.48)
Radka Donnell (1928–2013), as a former painter, used her training in her quilted works. Donnell was a feminist who eschewed the "art scene" in order to explore quilts as liberating creativity for women. As recently as 1996 she was still teaching in the field with a course on the history, theory, and techniques of quilting at Simmons College and Westfield State College in Massachusetts.[7] Charles and Rubynelle Counts, after studying at Berea College and elsewhere, started a crafts center. Charles Counts designed tops which were then quilted by local artisans. Rising Fawn, the crafts center, continued to produce quilts into the mid-1970s; the designs are little known today but are still distinctive. (Shaw, p.49–50)
Joan Lintault produced original textile and quilted art before quilting or quilt art became a national pastime. She and Therese May, as well as the Counts, had work that was first published by Jean Ray Laury in Quilts and Coverlets: A Contemporary Approach, 1970. While Lintault often makes openwork tops, May is known for her embellished and painted quilts, using private symbols and figures.[8]
Beth Gutcheon and Michael James were quilting instructors, beginning a trend which still allows quilting artists to earn income from a pursuit close to their art. Gutcheon published The Perfect Patchwork Primer in 1973. James' book, The Quiltmaker's Handbook: a Guide to Design and Construction (1978) was more technical. These two books are often cited as the place where contemporary quilt artists began. James' follow-up book, published in 1981 (The Second Quiltmaker's Handbook: Creative Approaches to Contemporary Quilt Design), showed his work as well as photos and analyses of art by Nancy Halpern, Beth Gutcheon, Radka Donnell, Nancy Crow, Francoise Barnes, and Katie Pasquini, among others. (Shaw, p.54)
By 2010 Gutcheon had established herself as a successful novelist based in New York City. James currently serves as Professor and Chair of the Department of Textiles, Merchandising & Fashion Design at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the academic home of the International Quilt Study Center & Museum, located in Quilt House.
Quilt House view, Robert A. M. Stern Associates Architects
James teaches courses in textile design and quilt studies, and continues his studio practice focused on non-traditional quilts incorporating digitally developed and digitally printed fabrics.
Nancy Crow, another influential teacher and writer of books, was instrumental in freeing quilting artists from certain preconceptions about rules. Her 1995 exhibit, Improvisational Quilts, was the first solo exhibition of art quilts done by the Renwick Gallery. (Shaw, p.66)
Two other quilt artists, Molly Upton (1953–1977) and Susan Hoffman, exhibited with Radka Donnell in 1975 at the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University. Also in 1975, Upton and Hoffman exhibited at the Kornblee Gallery on 57th Street in New York City. In doing so, they brought quilt art to the forefront as comparable to other forms of contemporary art. According to Robert Shaw, "Where other quilters were moving away from the traditional quilt one step at a time, seeing how far they could push the quilt format while still remaining connected to historical precedent, Hoffman and Upton largely ignored the rules and the assumed limitations of traditional quilting and simply leapt forward." (Shaw, p.60)
Other quilt artists working in the 1970s include Terrie Hancock Mangat, Gayle Fraas and Duncan Slade, Nancy Clearwater Herman, Jan Myers-Newbury, Pamela Studstill, Joan Schultz, Yvonne Porcella, Ruth McDowell, Katherine Westphal and Rise Nagin. (McMorris, Shaw)
The Quilters Hall of Fame (QHF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to honoring those who have made outstanding contributions to the world of quilting and quilted art. Many of the quilt artists discussed here appear in their list of honorees. The organization's list of honorees can be found on its website; early in their history, they had many honorees; now it appears that they generally honor only one and sometimes no quilt artists for their list.
Important early exhibits in the U.S.
Although many quilts made and displayed prior to the 1970s can now be defined as art, the form was most importantly recognized as legitimate art in the 1971 Whitney exhibit, Abstract Design in American quilts. That exhibit of pieced quilts from the 19th and early 20th centuries, organized by Jonathan Holstein, presented the quilts on stark white walls with simple gallery labels. Holstein organized the exhibit so that each piece could "be seen both as an isolated object and as part of a balanced flow of objects." This type of visual presentation marked a break from the traditional crowded hanging of quilts in county fairs and guild shows that had predominated throughout earlier displays. The exhibit was widely reviewed, including a glowing report by the New York Times art critic, Hilton Kramer.[9]
The presentation of pieced quilts, with their emphasis on color and geometric forms, fit perfectly into the art modes of the time. The abstract expressionists, like Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman, who used large swaths of color on canvas, had had their moment in the 1950s. They were followed in the 1960s by such hard edge abstractionists as Frank Stella. Thus the public had already been prepared for highly colored abstract art work; the pieced quilts in the Whitney exhibit fit into the current art scene. The Whitney's pieced art exhibit toured the country and was followed by a quilt craze, which reached a culmination in the Bicentennial events of 1976. Many quilts were made for that event and a revival of interest in quilting techniques and materials started giving artists expanded work potential. In addition the feminist movement of the late 60s and 70s produced a new interest in women who worked in the arts as well as formerly neglected women's work that could now be seen as art. Quilts, exhibited in galleries and museums, fit into the country's cultural and social concerns.
Other exhibits in the 1970s presented the "new type of quilt, one markedly different from its tradition-inspired counterparts."[10] "The Art Quilt" was a traveling exhibit, sponsored by the Art Museum Association of America, debuting at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery on October 1, 1986. Two other exhibits were "The New American Quilt" at The Museum of Contemporary Crafts in New York City in 1976 and "Quilt National" in 1979, the first of the still existing biennial exhibits spotlighting contemporary, generally original, designs. It too is a traveling exhibit.[11]
Other important exhibits of the 1970s include "Bed and Board", DeCordova Museum (a museum of twentieth-century American art), Lincoln, Massachusetts, 1975; "Quilts for 76", the Boston Center for the Arts, 1975; and "Quilted Tapestries," Kornblee Gallery, New York City, 1975. Many annual venues now exist in which quilt art is exhibited; these include the International Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas, and elsewhere, and Quilt Visions, in Oceanside, California.
Art quilts are now part of collections in museums such as the:
International Quilt Study Center & Museum, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska Quilt art exhibit installation view, International Quilt Study Center & Museum, University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Quilted art outside the U.S. has flourished in the UK, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Scandinavia, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and possibly elsewhere. More information about the art in these countries needs added to this site.
Professional organizations
The professional organization for quilt artists in the U.S. and elsewhere is Studio Art Quilt Associates, founded in 1989. SAQA's membership overlaps with other professional organizations, such as the Surface Design Association and the International Machine Quilter. Major exhibitions involving only quilt art are at Quilt National in Athens, Ohio, at The Dairy Barn Arts Center, Visions Art Museum (Quilt Visions), in San Diego California, and at The National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky. Art using quilting techniques are appropriate for all fine art venues. Many mixed media and collage art exhibitions are especially appropriate.
Making quilt art
A quilted work of art is generally defined as two layers of cloth held together by stitching. In most cases, a middle batting layer made of polyester, cotton, wool or silk is also incorporated.
Although quilt art originated in traditional quilting techniques, quilt artists now may use many different processes to create their artwork, including painting, dyeing, stamping, piecing, collage, printing (often incorporating a photograph printed onto fabric), applique, and other complex cloth processes.
Controversies in quilt art in the U.S.
In a field that straddles craft and art, the controversies can arise rather quickly. Jonathan Holstein recounts being accosted by traditional quilters who were confused by the quilts in the Whitney Museum of American Art exhibit, "which represented everything the traditional rules of the craft told them to avoid: sloppy work and assembly, bizarre color combinations, nasty materials.... Quilt makers had kept the craft alive and in a relatively pure state, the latter largely because no czars of culture had bothered to look closely at it....They made beautifully crafted quilts....The issue was hot for a long time, until enough exhibitions with orientations similar to the Whitney's had been seen across the country, and a constituency for new visual considerations in quilts had emerged." Holstein, p.57.
Holstein was also criticized for divorcing the quilts from their historical context, for applying a traditional male-dominated sense of aesthetic value to a woman's art, for dismissing applique quilts as artistically inferior to pieced examples, and for his apparent lack of concern as a collector for the stories of the women who made the quilts, "thereby marginalizing the makers by denying them their personal identities." Shaw, p. 54
Some of these controversies continue to the present day. Lorre M Weidlich, in the Spring 1996 (vol. 6, #9) Newsletter of the Studio Art Quilt Associates, uses Carol Gilligan's theory of the differences between male and female values to reject Michael James's call for stronger art in the quilt art world. She says that "the male, Jamesian model of 'quilt art' violates the very qualities that initially attracted women to quilting and reinforce their continuing pursuit of it. It feel[s], to a great many of them, alien. The imposition of a male model on a women's expressive form leaves in a position of discomfort the very people who are the life blood of the expressive form." Weidlich p 9.[12] Weidlich argues that quilts emphasize relationship and connection, and that James would remove those association to conform to male standards of the artist as idiosyncratic and subversive.
Other observers of the evolution of the quilt art medium point to the long time participation of quilt making by men. The Weidlich argument could be interpreted more against elite art attitudes and less about gender appropriation. In one of the forward essays to "Man Made Quilts: Civil War to the Present" an exhibition at the Shelburne Museum in 2012, Joe Cunningham points out, "In the centuries before the American Revolution, quilting was a technique learned as a part of the tailor's craft in England. The best known tailor/quilter is Joe Hedley(1750-1826) of Northumberland....." Cunningham goes on to cite many more examples of male quilt making from the past up to the present. Jean Burks essay also lists multiple examples of men creating quilts and states, "No discussion of male contributions to quilting would be complete without mentioning the considerable achievements of psychiatrist William Rush Dunton (1868-1966). Dr Dunton, the founder of the American Occupational Therapy Association, encouraged his patients to pursue quilting as a curative activity/therapeutic diversion...."[13]
Another controversy involves the work and people in the isolated Alabama hamlet of Gee's Bend. In the early 21st century, the Gee's Bend quilters, "discovered" by folk art collectors Bill and Matt Arnett, became celebrated as artists and toured the U.S. widely, carrying their "piece quilts" to innumerable communities where they gave talks about their lives and work. Coffee table books showed the work and lives of the Gee's Bend artists; items used domestically began to appear, bearing their designs. A lawsuit arose over whether the women's work was legally obtained and licensed by the Arnetts, who apparently sold the rights to the design for use in home dec designs. U.S. District Judge Callie Granade of Mobile dismissed the suits.[14]
Most of these controversies have become muted as the fine arts have opened up to a vast variety of materials and methods. The materials and structures assembled by quilt artists have gone beyond or negated many of the older connotations of the quilt. Nevertheless, many questions and concerns remain and are hotly debated.
Contemporary quilt artists
Most quilt artists work in the area of the fine arts, specifically the visual arts. Their works are not generally functional in nature, although there are exceptions. The primary professional English-speaking organization of artists using quilting materials and techniques is the Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA), the members of which all count themselves as fine artists. SAQA has more than 3500 members as of May 29, 2020 [15]. A number of contemporary fine artists employ quilting techniques in their work. In the Fall, 2010 issue of the "Surface Design Association Journal", Michael James names the following as contemporary fine artists working with quilting techniques: Michael Cummings, Ursula Rauch, Ai Kijima, Lynn Setterington, Dorothy Caldwell, Diana Harrison, Tracey Emin, Velda Newman, Clare Plug, Anna Von Mertens, Linda MacDonald, M.Joan Lintault, Susan Shie, Terrie Mangat, and Jo Budd. [citation needed]
There are some artists that are not using quilting techniques of hand sewing, machine sewing or long arm for example, but who the quilting 'world' have taken an interest. Artists like Fraser Smith,[16][17] who carves 'quilts' out of wood that look like actual quilts. Ian Berry who uses only denim to create his works, but uses glue, not quilting[18][19] has shown extensively in the Fine Art world.[20]
Related Research Articles
Quilting is the process of joining a minimum of three layers of fabric together either through stitching manually using a needle and thread, or mechanically with a sewing machine or specialised longarm quilting system. An array of stitches is passed through all layers of the fabric to create a three-dimensional padded surface. The three layers are typically referred to as the top fabric or quilt top, batting or insulating material, and the backing.
A quilt is a multi-layered textile, traditionally composed of two or more layers of fabric or fiber. Commonly three layers are used with a filler material. These layers traditionally include a woven cloth top, a layer of batting or wadding, and a woven back combined using the techniques of quilting. This is the process of sewing on the face of the fabric, and not just the edges, to combine the three layers together to reinforce the material. Stitching patterns can be a decorative element. A single piece of fabric can be used for the top of a quilt, but in many cases the top is created from smaller fabric pieces joined, or patchwork. The pattern and color of these pieces creates the design. Quilts may contain valuable historical information about their creators, "visualizing particular segments of history in tangible, textured ways".
Wearable art, also known as Artwear or "art to wear", refers to art pieces in the shape of clothing or jewellery pieces. These pieces are usually handmade, and are produced only once or as a very limited series. Pieces of clothing are often made with fibrous materials and traditional techniques such as crochet, knitting, quilting, but may also include plastic sheeting, metals, paper, and more. While the making of any article of clothing or other wearable object typically involves aesthetic considerations, the term wearable art implies that the work is intended to be accepted as an artistic creation or statement. Wearable art is meant to draw attention while it is being displayed, modeled or used in performances. Pieces may be sold and exhibited.
Fiber art refers to fine art whose material consists of natural or synthetic fiber and other components, such as fabric or yarn. It focuses on the materials and on the manual labor on the part of the artist as part of the works' significance, and prioritizes aesthetic value over utility.
The quilts of Gee's Bend are quilts created by a group of women and their ancestors who live or have lived in the isolated African-American hamlet of Gee's Bend, Alabama along the Alabama River.
Rosie Lee Tompkins (1936–2006) is the art pseudonym of Effie Mae Martin Howard, a widely acclaimed African-American quiltmaker and fiber artist of Richmond, California. The New York Times called her "one of the great American artists," and her work "one of the century’s major artistic accomplishments." More than 500 works by Tompkins reside at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive.
Sue Reno is a fiber artist from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Michael Francis James is an American artist, educator, author, and lecturer. He is best known as a leader of the art quilt movement that began in the 1970s. He currently lives and maintains a studio in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Katherine Westphal was an American textile designer and fiber artist who helped to establish quilting as a fine art form.
Radka Donnell, was a feminist, painter, art therapist, poet, translator, storyteller, and pioneer of modern quilt-making. She explored what quilts can mean and look like, as distinct from traditional quilting and the fine arts culture.
Linda MacDonald was born in 1946, in Berkeley, California. She is a multimedia artist who was at the forefront of the studio quilt art movements. She has been called a "fine artist [who works] with quilting techniques."
Yvonne Porcella was an American art quilter.
Malcolm Armstrong Harrison was a New Zealand clothing designer and textile artist.
Therese May is an American artist who was an early participants in the art quilt movement that began in the 1960s. She is known for her mixed media quilts and is featured in several contemporary quilting histories.
Jean Ray Laury was an American artist and designer. She was one of the first fine artists to move to quilting as a medium of choice in the late 1950s. Her quilts followed neither traditional method nor pattern; they were bold, modern, colorful collages, often laced with humor and satire. Penning over twenty books and teaching over 2,000 workshops, Laury helped women see the creative possibilities in everyday objects and awake their sense of inspiration. Laury has been called a "foremother of a quilt revival", and "one of the pioneers" of non-traditional quilts.
Martha Neill Upton was a watercolorist, sculptor and studio quilt artist. Her quilted tapestries helped quilts become seen as fine art, rather than craft work, during the early 1970s. Her quilts were shown in the first major museum exhibition of non-traditional quilts, The New American Quilt at New York's Museum of Arts and Design, then called the Museum of Contemporary Craft, in 1976.
The Studio Art Quilt Associates, abbreviated as SAQA, is a leading non-profit advocacy group for art quilts based in Hebron, Connecticut, in the United States.
Bisa Butler is an American fiber artist who has created a new genre of quilting that has transformed the medium. Although quilting has long been considered a craft, her interdisciplinary methods—which create quilts that look like paintings—have catapulted quilting into the field of fine art. She is known for her vibrant, quilted portraits celebrating Black life, portraying both everyday people and notable historical figures. Her works now count among the permanent collections at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the Art Institute of Chicago, Pérez Art Museum Miami and about a dozen other art museums nationwide. She has also exhibited at the Smithsonian Museum of American History, the Epcot Center, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, and many other venues. In 2020, she was commissioned to quilt cover images for Time magazine, including the "Person of the Year" issue and its "100 Women of the Year" issue. With a multi-year wait list for private commissions, one of Butler's quilts sold at auction in 2021 for $75,000 USD.
Susan Hoffman is an American quilt artist.
Yvonne Wells is an African-American folk artist and quilter from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. She is best known for her self-taught style and her story quilts depicting scenes from the Bible and the Civil Rights Movement. Her work has been exhibited at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and at the International Quilt Museum.
↑ Bolton, Patricia (2008). The Quilting Arts Book. Loveland, CO, USA: Interweave Press LLC. p.6. ISBN978-1-59668-099-9.
↑ Shaw 1997 Shaw's work is the most complete published study of quilt art. The book, 10 inches by 14 inches, includes 308 illustrations, most of them full page spreads of individual works of art. An excerpt from the book can be found at Shaw, Robert (2007). "A History of the Art Quilt, excerpted from The Art Quilt". Studio Arts Quilt Associates. Archived from the original on 2007-05-09. Retrieved 2007-09-16.
↑ Michael James' remarks, to which Weidlich was responding, were given as a keynote address to the American Quilters Society Quilt Show and Contest Awards Banquet and subsequently published as "Quilt Art at Century's End," American Quilter, Vol VII, #3 (Fall, 1992) pp. 52-74.
↑ Burks, Jean; Cunningham, Joe (2012). Man Made Quilts: Civil War to the Present. Shelburne Museum Inc. pp.1–26. ISBN978-0-939384-37-2.
↑ Johnson, Bob (08-25-2008). "Suits brought by rural Alabama quilters resolved", Associated Press
Holstein, Jonathan (1991), Abstract Design in American Quilts: a Biography of an Exhibition, Louisville, Kentucky: The Kentucky Quilt Project, ISBN1-880584-00-X
McMorris, Penny; Kile, Michael (1986), The Art Quilt, San Francisco, CA: The Quilt Digest Press, ISBN0-913327-08-5 McMorris's book contains a great deal of history about the social conditions that led to the rise of quilting and art quilting in the 1960s.
Shaw, Robert (1997), The Art Quilt, N/A: Hugh Lauter Levin Associates, Inc, ISBN0-88363-325-6
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