Gee’s Bend

December 18th, 2007

Have we been sick around here. Icky yucky drippy coughy all-the-day-in-bed sick. I felt it coming on last Sunday and barely made my way through work until Thursday, when I couldn’t even finish drying my hair before collapsing into bed. But, we’re feeling much better around here, and elated that next week I don’t have to go into work once! A whole week!

Speaking of last Sunday, I drove down to the Tacoma Art Museum to see the last day of the exhibition Gee’s Bend: The Architecture of a Quilt. It was a stunning display of quilting. These women who live in an enclave, a bend, outside of Alabama society–the rural South–have passed down the tradition of quilting, like many women. Set apart, though, this tribe of plantation slave descendants make quilts that look like modern art. Women who have never been to museums, or finished high school, or have TVs. Quilts that are a hundred years old. Aren’t they gorgeous? Denyse Schmidt’s quilts, which I’ve admired since I first saw them in blogland, are strikingly similar–she must have garnered inspiration from the lovely ladies of Gee’s Bend. Has anyone heard her talk about this? I decided to buy the exhibition catalogue, which is oversized and full-color, because I want to pattern my quilting after theirs. It was just the inspiration I needed to start my next quilt.

Entry Filed under: Blog,Crafts