American Folk Art Museum

During our stay in NYC (Sep 2010) I managed to get to the AFAM - wouldn’t you know it, it was partially closed to install an exhibition.  That exhibition (she said breathing deeply) was Quilts: Masterworks from the AFAM – a two part exhibition and a book big enough to gulp my entire baggage allowance in one foul swoop. 

Thankfully bad weather had a quilted lining and our side trip to Washington meant that I could manage a few hours at the exhibition a few days later.  His Nibs kindly agreed to catch an even later bus back to our floating home at Great Kills Harbor (he'd discovered Sotherbys). 

I started off by just looking; trying to take it all in.  The range of quilts was amazing and made me want to rush home and start something new.  (Oh, that cursed UFO box!)  I then saw other people taking photographs so I spent some time hoping my camera would adjust successfully to the low light levels.  

Not all my photos turned out, but enough for a memory jogger as I knew that wonderful book was well beyond my a. budget and b. luggage allowance.  After that, and now with security guards watching me through slitted eyes, I started taking notes.  

Don't you just love that wall colour!!

So, in some sort of historic order, (and almost cryptic summary) we were treated to quilted examples of:

Whole Cloth (1750 to 1850): British legacy & flaunting large pieces of expensive cloth

Chintz & Stencilled (1775 to 1865): showed colonialism’s reach to the Far East

Pieced (1840 to present) meaning, tradition and ritual became strong in designs

Amish (1849): beauty in simplicity and restraint; a strict pattern code

Applique (1840 to 1900’s): in particular Baltimore style’s ravishing storytelling

Log Cabin (1860): described as the beginning of an American “style” and shows pioneering spirit

Crazy (1880 to 1910): quilted, embroidered and enhanced, Victorian in every way; exposure to Japanese crazed ceramics and asymmetrical art at the 1876 Philadelphia Exposition

Signature (1900’s): raising money for good deeds and sharing in times of need

Show or Exhibition (1900’s): introducing cultural & technological advances to an amazed public (Edwardian society)

Colonial Revival (1910-1950): looking to the past for inspiration; represented an ideal rather than reality; felt a need for a simpler life

African American (1920): famous for pushing the limits of our concept of quilt design and manufacture

Contemporary (1960): again the start of a revival; taking new directions and for some no holds barred 

Again, I stress that I don’t want to be too prescriptive.  There are far too many quilt historians out there who really do know what they are on about.  I did find one or two interesting sites to satisfy my curiosity however.  Try Barbara Brackman's Civil War blog (and see if you can't resist making up her weekly blocks!) or this historical summary on Quilters Bee.  There are plenty of others too. 

I don't know about you, but I suffer from time to time with patchwork burnout. You'll recognise the symptoms - lack of inspiration or motivation, wondering why you need to make another quilt, walking past your machine without even stopping to pat it....  I could go on.  Let me tell you, seeing quilts hanging, even if you organise a showing of your own or your group's (finished or not!) is very heart lifting.  So, well done to the AFAM. I’m just sorry I couldn’t get to see Part 2 of the exhibit.