Gees Bend Quilts Archives

A Gift of nearly 3,000 Quilts

Over all a gift of nearly 3,000 quilts, was announced Wednesday, Oct. 16,2020. Furthermore, all of the quilts were designed and produced by African American artists. Officials of the UC Berkeley Art Museum announced the gift. Eli Leon put together the extensive collection over more than three decades. Dr.Leon was a white Oakland psychotherapist. Meanwhile he became a respected expert on African American quilts. When Leon died in 2019, he left the quilts and a few other items to the Regents of the University of California. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Eli-Leon-scholar-and-collector-of-African-12757330.php

Stories of Communities of Color

Furthermore,the quilts help to broaden the horizons of art history. In addition this will include the culture and the stories of communities of color. In just the past few years, exhibitions of works by artists of color have been taking place in museums worldwide. Above all,collectors and institutions are trying to diversify their collections. https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/art-exhibits/why-is-african-american-art-having-a-moment-the-reasons-are-as-varied-as-the-art-itself

Major Commitments

In addition,the two largest visual arts organizations, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, made major commitments. This year, SFMOMA sold a key Mark Rothko painting to raise millions of dollars . For example,this will enable the museum to broaden its collection through purchases of works by women, LGBTQ artists and artists of color. After that,the Fine Arts Museums acquired 62 works by 22 contemporary African American artists .

Rosie Lee Tompkins, Untitled (1996), quilted by Irene Bankhead.

Similarly,Lawrence Rinder knew Leon. In the past,they had worked together on an exhibition of the quilts of Rosie Lee Tompkins. In addition,more than 500 works of Ms. Tompkins are part of the the gift. Moving forward, Mr. Rinder will curate a larger Tompkins show as his final project before retiring He said the quilts are decidedly not “folk art.”

It’s Art Art

Likewise,“Not to me,” he was quick to say. “I think it’s ‘art art.’ I don’t make those distinctions. To clarigy, labels like that justify the exclusion of people who are less well off or people who are not white.

“Some people think if you slap a label , it can help us understand where it comes from.On the other hand, I don’t care about any of that at all. Most importantly,I see emotion, expression, technical skill. … The rest doesn’t matter to me in the least.”

Monin Brown and Hattie “Strawberry” Mitchell

Adventurous Designs

For example,Leon tended to collect adventurous designs. However,it was not because the works look modern. “He believed deeply in a connection to African traditions. He conducted research on motifs, patterns and methods that he saw as rooted in Central Africa,”

Variations on a Theme,artist unknown

Funds for Conservation

After that,Rinder said gifts and grants are being sought to fund conservation of the fragile works. Moreover, he believes the university is committed to their care and display. Furthermore in a statement, UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ said, “BAMPFA is uniquely suited to ensure that these wonderful works of art receive the exposure and attention they deserve.”

Eli Leon in his quilt storage room

Charles Desmarais is The San Francisco Chronicle’s art critic. Email: cdesmarais@sfchronicle.com Free weekly newsletter: http://bit.ly/ArtguyReviews

A Riveting Testament to Those Once Neglected Black Self Taught Artists

ART REVIEW from the NY Times, May 24, 2018 At the Met

By Roberta Smith May 24, 2018

American art by Black self taught artists from the 20th and 21st centuries is a broader and better form than previously admitted. Currently,museums struggle to become more inclusive. Above all,they give new prominence to neglected works. Moreover, William Arnett and his Souls Grown Deep Foundation helped to shine a light. Their focus is the important achievement of black self-taught artists of the American South. In other words,these artists were born of extreme deprivation and social cruelty.

About the Photograph

Thornton Dial’s two-sided relief-painting-assemblage. “History Refused to Die” (2004) gives this Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition its title. His work is in conversation with quilts. From the left, Lola Pettway (“Housetop,” circa 1975); Lucy T. Pettway (“Housetop” and “Bricklayer” blocks with bars, circa 1955); and Annie Mae Young (“Work-clothes quilt with center medallion of strips,” from 1976). Credit 2018 Estate of Thornton Dial/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Agaton Strom for The New York Times

Souls Grown Deep Foundation

The Souls Grown Deep Foundation is in the process of sharing the entirety of its considerable holdings. Meanwhile,some 1,200 works by more than 160 artists are sent to museums across the country. In short,this will have a substantial impact on black self taught artists.

The Met

As a result,the Met was the first of the foundation’s beneficiaries, receiving a gift of 57 artworks by 30 artists in 2014. Now, the museum celebrates its fortune with “History Refused to Die: Highlights From the Souls Grown Deep Foundation Gift.” That is to say a selection of 29 pieces many of them rarely shown. After that it created an electrifying sense of change.

An Electrifying Sense of Change for Black Self Taught Artists

The Met’s curators took nearly two years and several trips to Atlanta to finalize their selection. Moreover,they chose well. In short,the show seems nearly perfect in art, installation and greatness. Randall R. Griffey and Amelia Peck, curators, organized well.

Majestic Effect

Furthermore,the effect is majestic. In short,the show validates the art’s stature. It transforms the Met’s footprint of African art and American folk art. Nine of Thornton Dial’s fierce, self-aware works are here. Mostly his relief paintings. Three extraordinary drawings commemorate Sept. 11, Florence Griffith Joyner and Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration.

Gee’s Bend Quilts

A dozen of the geometric quilts are here. Both muted and boisterous, they challenge the conventional history of abstraction. Furthermore,they reflect the talents of the Gee’s Bend collective, especially those of the Pettway family. Truly, black self taught artists.Nearly everything included is made from scavenged objects and materials, scraps of the shameful history of black labor in the South. One of the most valuable lessons here is the works’ inherent sense of defiance. In short,their beauty in itself as an act of resistance.

Two very Different Galleries

The show’s two galleries have very different emotional and visual tones. After beckoning you from down the corridor with the bright colors and joyful asymmetry of Loretta Pettway’s “Medallion” quilt (circa 1960), the exhibition starts with a room of works nearly devoid of color.

“Shadows of the Field”

Dial’s “Shadows of the Field” (2008) evokes haunted expanses of cotton plants with the help of strips of synthetic cotton batting. Along one wall, the “work-clothes” quilts of Lucy Mingo and four other Gee’s Benders reflect lives of hard labor and scrimping. Their fabrics are almost exclusively blues and gray denim whose worn textures and faded colors are masterfully played off one another.Emma Lee Pettway Campbell’s Blocks are strips work-clothes quilt from around 1950.All things considered they are accomplished black self taught artists.

Lady looking at the 3D Fiber Art on the museum wall — Thornton Dial’s “Shadows of the Field” (2008)

Joe Minter’s 1995 symmetrical arrangement of rusted shovels, rakes, hoes and chains, seems to bless the whole room. Regal and severe, it suggests both a group of figures and an altar. Moreover,its title pulls no punches: “Four Hundred Years of Free Labor.”

an arrangement of rusted shovels, rakes, hoes and chains — Joe Minter’s “Four Hundred Years of Free Labor”

Second Gallery of Black Self Taught Artists

The second gallery erupts in color brilliant in palette as in use of materials. Gee’s Bend quilts deliver. Lucy T. Pettway’s traditional housetop and bricklayer patterns are in a quilt from around 1955. Annie Mae Young’s 1976 work brings together the quilt tradition of a medallion of burning stripes of contrasting corduroy with a broad denim work-clothes border.

A dozen of the 18 geometric quilts included in the Souls Grown Deep Foundation gift are here, including Lucy T. Pettway’s “Housetop” and “Bricklayer” blocks with bars, left, and Mary Elizabeth Kennedy’s “Housetop-nine-block ‘Log Cabin’ variation.”Credit2018 Lucy T. Pettway/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Agaton Strom for the New York Times

Jaw-dropping Dial

Blessing the artworks here is a jaw-dropping Dial: a two-sided relief-painting-assemblage. It is the source of the exhibition’s title, “History Refused to Die.” One side shows a couple chained to, yet sheltered, to a white metal structure. Surrounded by a wild expanse,pieces of fabric knotted seem to billow and blow like a stormy sea or clouds.

The Other Side

The other side is a rough weaving of the straight stalks of the okra plant. Okra came to the United States from Africa during the slave trade. Its scattered colors are primarily the red, black, green and yellow. The same colors as the 13-striped Afro-American flag. At the upper right, the simple silhouette of a white dove of peace or freedom. At the top, a row of short steel angle beams are spray-painted with horizontal dashes of browns and black.

Similarly Simply Masterpieces

Several other works here are similarly simply masterpieces. In “Locked Up Their Minds,” Purvis Young offers his own version of James Ensor’s “Christ’s Entry Into Brussels in 1889.” Young’s large painting on wood shows a group of black figures. Some of the figures have halos. Others are holding up padlocks signifying their freed minds to flocks of angels. Two immense white horses add to the drama. The show’s final piece is Dial’s ironically titled “Victory in Iraq,” a painting from 2004. It hangs just outside the second gallery. Its barbed wire and twisted mesh against a field of fabric defines and holds the space.

edited for length

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African American Quilts On Display

Art Museum inherits 3,000 African American Quilts