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Manhattan Heat Wave, 1987, Elizabeth Cave, H. 66.5 x 81.5 inches, Mansfield, OH |
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February 16 - June 3, 2007
Carol & Louis Della Penna Gallery, New Hope
Wild By Design: 200 Years Of Innovation And Artistry In American Quilts was sponsored by P& B Textiles, with additional support from: Mancuso Show Management, Nancy & David Bischoff, The Nouveau Magazine, Pidcock Partners, Sew Smart Fabrics, Steve Darlington of Prudential Fox & Roach, The Historic Lambertville House, and Triumph Brewing Company.
The making of a quilt brings together beauty and practicality, as well as
history, community and culture. The exhibition features 24 dynamic quilts
from the collection of the International Quilt Study Center and explores
originality, abstraction, and figurative design by quilt makers from the
early 1800s through today.
Album, ca. 1860-1880, Maker Unknown, H. 80.5 x W. 78 inches, United States | |
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"Many people think of quilts primarily as exercises in rigorously geometric
repeat patterning," said Janet Berlo, co-curator of the exhibition and
Professor of Art History at the University of Rochester. "Yet a great
free-wheeling tradition exists in quiltmaking in which improvisation,
asymmetry, and experimentation are the norm... this creative and original
artistic impulse can be documented back to the early years of quiltmaking
in this country. For at least two hundred years, American women artists have
made quilts in which off-beat color placement and manipulation of printed
textile patterns have combined with bold experimentation in block
formation and appliquié.
A quilt grows out of many aspects of the makers' life: scraps of fabric
saved from worn garments can be reminders of good times and bad times.
Some quilts record an event, portray a story or symbolize the nature of
the human spirit.
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