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The Art of Quilts
June 2002
It’s a pleasure to feature this selection of outstanding works of art selected from those that will be exhibited at the Great Catskill Mountain Quilt Show, July 13 and 14, as part of the Mountain Culture Festival in the Village of Hunter.
Technically, quilt-making is considered a craft, presumably because it is designed to perform a function rather than stand alone as a creative image. But these days the distinction between craft and art has all but disappeared. Sundials, for instance, have performed the vital function of telling time since the dawn of history, but those by such contemporary artists as Henry Moore and Maty Gruenberg are clearly identifiable as fine works of art. And so are the remarkable quilts features in this issue of GUIDE.
The cover image is an ingenious composition of different materials that together form a representation of a bird in flight. It is a collage of at least ten different patterns that give color and texture to the work. The quilt on the front of the portfolio represents a bowl of flowers with a butterfly hovering above—a complex image made up of more patterns than one can count and in many different sizes and shapes. On the page opposite this text, is a geometric pattern that resembles a flower and has been photographed in a special light that dramatizes the unusual texture of the surface.
The double spread that follows presents two realistic images. On the left is a portrait of a woman with blue eyes and dark brown hair wearing a lovely necklace and a grand white dress. She seems to be holding a whiskered cat that is staring at the viewer. On the right is an impressive stained glass window with rich colors and striking forms; one can even see rays of light coming from the left, and a lovely collection of flowers below.
The last three quilts are more abstract. One can imagine a Japanese dancer in the first, but what is most striking is the creative way the different patterns form a composition against the black background. The second is an inventive juxtaposition of colored triangles, with almost invisible spirals stitched on the surface. And the last is a combination of squares and triangles with sharply contrasting colors that make it one of the strongest images in the collection.
These are all works of outstanding imagination, skill and sensitivity, and we see them as worthy contributions to the art of the Catskill Region.
— David Finn
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