Warning – this is a wordy
post, but the subject has always intrigued me.
Frances O’Roark Dowell of
Quilters Alliance posed an interesting question on The Quilter’s Alliance Story
Circle Facebook page today (here). Her question was “Is quilting an art or a
craft?”
I had written an article many
years back about this very subject and since it is far too wordy for a Facebook
post, I will publish it here. Grab a cup of tea (or two!) and if you make it
all the way to the end, let me know what you think about the subject.
I wrote this in 2004 in response
to a lecture on “art quilts” that I had recently attended. I was most assuredly
one of the only (if not the only) traditional quilter in the room. The
only “traditional” quilters named were African Americans whose fame has sky
rocketed in the last few years with the Gees Bend exhibition. Amish quilts were
noted as being the quintessential art form with their simple designs and
striking colors. Very little was said about today’s traditional quilter and how
we are struggling to keep traditions alive. The focus was more on the
statements that today’s art quilters are making.
Artist or Quilter?
By Wendy Caton Reed
It finally happened to me!
Someone asked me one of the most intriguing and perhaps complex questions posed
to today’s quiltmakers; “Do you consider yourself an artist?”
I’ve always considered myself
to be a quilter. My mother’s an artist and although I’ve often thought some of
her talent should have rubbed off onto me, I can’t sketch a rock with a
kindergarten crayon. So maybe there is more to it than just the ability to
draw. I decided to seek help from my local library. I picked up the largest
dictionary I could carry (c 1910) and this is what I found:
Art n. 1.a. The use of imagination and skill to
create beautiful things. b. Works, as paintings, which result from this
creativity. 2. A field of artistic activity, as literature, music, or dance. 3.
A nonscientific branch of learning, esp. one of humanities. 4. A craft or trade
and the methods employed in it. 5. A practical skill or knack. 6. The quality
of being cunning: artfulness.
Quilt n. A padded bed cover. - quilt v. –
quilting n.
Being the highly analytical
person that I am, I took it step by step to see which word described me best.
We’ll start with “Art” (since
it comes first alphabetically).
1.
a. The use of
imagination and skill to create beautiful things. I don’t want to “toot my
own horn”, but I think I do create some beautiful quilts and I have one of the
most active imaginations of anyone I know, so I guess we can put a check by
this one!
b. Works,
as paintings, which result from this creativity. Even though I don’t see
the word “quilt” in this definition, I certainly have plenty of “works” around
the place (in one stage or another), so this is a check too.
2.
A field of
artistic activity, as literature, music, or dance. Wow, this is
a weird one! They don’t even mention painting,
let alone quilting.
Maybe they just ran out of room or they
figured 3 examples were
enough and people could draw their own
conclusions, so we’ll put a
check
by this one as well.
3.
A
nonscientific branch of learning, esp. one of humanities. This could be a
tricky one because although there are thousands of people out there teaching
“quilting” and even a few institutions of higher learning that have quilts and
quilt history as part of their curriculum (usually lumped in with women’s
studies or material culture studies), there usually is some math involved. I don’t think there is enough math involved to take it out of the
humanities column, but I’m going to leave this one blank anyway.
4.
A craft or
trade and the methods employed in it.
Gee, I think this fits best of all. I spend more time quilting than I do
anything else. When I don’t have a needle in my hand, I have visions of the
next quilt dancing around my brain (even in my sleep!). There are hundreds of
new ideas each year in our “trade or craft”, and although I have learned a new
trick or two over time, my “methods employed” haven’t changed much in my 50+
years of quiltmaking. This is a definite check.
5.
A practical
skill or knack. Can’t get much more
practical than something to cover the bed and keep you warm on those cold Maine
nights and some people say I have a natural knack for it. Check again.
6.
The quality of
being cunning: artfulness. I don’t
think this one has anything to do with the subject here, but I don’t want to
leave anything out so I’ll answer it anyway. My father used to say I was
cunnin’, but that is Maine for “cute” (or at least that’s what I was
always lead to believe). However, since it really doesn’t have anything to do
with art or quilts, I guess we’ll have to leave it blank.
Now, we’ll go on to the word
“Quilt”:
1)
A padded bed
covering. Granted this dictionary was
dated 1910 and things in the quilt world have certainly changed since then, but
I just can’t believe that “art” gets 7 full definitions (don’t forget #1 had an
a. and b.) and this is all they can find to describe “quilt”?
If I had to choose a title
based on a dictionary’s literal definitions, I would be a fool not to pick the
more substantial and far more romantic “Artist” (heck, “Quilter” isn’t even a
word in this dusty old book).
So, I think I would have to
say that I am an artist who creates quilts. I make them because it makes
me happy. I love the whole process; designing, color choice, fabric shopping, pattern
play, piecing, appliqué and quilting. I love giving my quilts to friends,
relatives and people in need. My grandfather used to say that wood warms you
twice: once when you chop it and again when you burn it! That is the way I feel
about my quilts.
And as far as quilter vs artist, who says you can’t be both!
So, what do you think? How
far have we really come? How far do we want to go? My feeling is there is just
as strong a gap between “traditional artist” and “art quilter” as there is
between “art quilter” and “traditional quilter”.
Have a very quilty day!
