Philadelphia Museum of Art

How curious a land is this,—how full of untold story, of tragedy

and laughter, and the rich legacy of human life; shadowed

with a tragic past, and big with future promise!

– W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk

GEE’S BEND:

THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE QUILT

AND AFRICAN AMERICAN

QUILTMAKING TRADITIONS



A RESOURCE GUIDE

FOR TEACHERS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

OVERVIEW ...................................................................................................................................... 1

QUILT BASICS ................................................................................................................................. 2

QUILTS IN THE GEE’S BEND: THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE QUILT EXHIBITION:

ABOUT GEE’S BEND ........................................................................................................... 3

QUILTMAKING IN GEE’S BEND .......................................................................................... 4

QUILTMAKERS:

WILLIE “MA WILLIE” ABRAMS ............................................................................. 5

LOUISIANA P. BENDOLPH ...................................................................................... 7

MARY LEE BENDOLPH ........................................................................................... 9

LORETTA P. BENNETT .......................................................................................... 11

LUCY MINGO ....................................................................................................... 13

LORETTA PETTWAY ............................................................................................. 15

AFRICAN AMERICAN QUILTS IN THE

PHILADELPHIA MUSEUM OF ART’S PERMANENT COLLECTION:

INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................ 17

QUILTMAKERS:

UNKNOWN QUILTMAKER (GEE’S BEND, ALABAMA) ......................................... 19

PEARLIE POSEY .................................................................................................... 21

FAITH RINGGOLD ................................................................................................ 23

SARAH MARY TAYLOR ........................................................................................ 25

SELECTED CHRONOLOGY ............................................................................................................ 27

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES FOR STUDY ......................................................................................... 30

VOCABULARY .............................................................................................................................. 33

BASIC BUILDING BLOCKS OF QUILTS .......................................................................................... 36

DIAMANTE POEM FORMAT ......................................................................................................... 37

Gee’s Bend: The Architecture of the Quilt has been organized by the Museum of Fine Arts,

Houston, and Tinwood Alliance, Atlanta. The exhibition is supported by a MetLife

Foundation Museum and Community Connections grant, by The Pew Charitable Trusts,

and by The Women’s Committee of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Education and

community outreach programs are funded by The Delphi Project Foundation, Reliance

Standard Life Insurance Company, the Connelly Foundation, Paul K. Kania, and Lynne

and Harold Honickman. Promotional support is provided by NBC 10 WCAU and The

Philadelphia Tribune.

Pictured on the sticker:

Blocks, Strips, Strings, and Half-Squares Quilt, 2005, by Mary Lee Bendolph (Collection of

the Tinwood Alliance. Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois)

1

OVERVIEW

This resource guide was developed by the Division of Education of the Philadelphia

Museum of Art to complement the exhibition Gee’s Bend: The Architecture of the Quilt

(September 16–December 14, 2008) and to serve as an ongoing resource for teachers.

The guide provides information about ten quilts created by African American women

who worked throughout the twentieth century. Six of the quilts are on view in the Gee’s

Bend exhibition and the remaining four are in the permanent collection of the

Philadelphia Museum of Art.

The ten quilts in this guide suggest the range of the many styles, influences, and

materials found within African American quiltmaking traditions. The quilts have many

stories to tell of artistic innovation, triumph over hardship, and pride in heritage. It is

important to note that these quilts are a small sampling of a much larger production, for

many quilts have been lost to history. Each quilt is a product of its own particular social,

historical, and personal context. For this reason, the text prioritizes the quiltmakers’

own words, biographical information, and descriptions of their working methods.

Note: The quotes from the artists were taken from personal interviews and therefore reflect the

informality of that form of communication. As you read the quotes, listen for the richness of the

spoken word and the rhythms that characterize the dialect of the American South.

RESOURCES

The resources listed below can be used to introduce the material to K–12 students as

pre- or post-visit lessons, or instead of a Museum visit.

 A full-color poster

 A CD-ROM containing a PowerPoint presentation that includes digital images

of the quilts examined in this printed guide and “looking questions” to initiate

discussions

 Information about ten quilts and the artists who made them

 Language arts, social studies, math, and art curriculum connections

 A selected chronology

 A resource list for further study

 A vocabulary list, which includes all words that have been bolded in the text 

2

QUILT BASICS

 Most quilts are made of three layers: a top that is decorative, a middle of soft

batting that adds thickness and provides warmth, and a back.

 These three layers are stitched, or quilted, together.

 The quilts included in this guide fall into two categories: pieced and appliqué.

Pieced quilts have a top made of bits of fabric stitched, or pieced, together.

Appliqué quilts have tops that consist of background blocks of fabric with cutout

shapes of fabric sewn on top. 

3

ABOUT GEE’S BEND

Gee’s Bend, Alabama, is a rural community of about 700 people, most of whom are

African American, located on a fifteen-mile stretch of land nestled in a hairpin turn of

the Alabama River. The area is named for Joseph Gee, who established a cotton

plantation there in 1816. In 1845, Mark Pettway bought the estate, which encompassed

thousands of acres of land and 101 enslaved people. Pettway also forced slaves from his

North Carolina home to walk across four states to Alabama. Many residents of Gee’s

Bend are descendants of these people, a large number of whom still bear Pettway’s last

name.

After the American Civil War (1861–65), the majority of the freed slaves in Gee’s Bend

became tenant farmers and remained in the area. During the Great Depression

(1929–39), the price of cotton plummeted, causing economic strife in Gee’s Bend. It was

identified as one of the poorest towns in the nation, prompting the administration of

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to establish a program to build new homes and

offer residents low-interest mortgages. While many African American families in the

South moved North in the ensuing years, these homeowners stayed.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., visited Gee’s Bend in 1965 and encouraged citizens to

register to vote and to join him in a march to Selma, Alabama. Many Gee’s Bend women

were jailed for these actions. In additional retaliation, the ferry service that connected

Gee’s Bend to the larger town of Camden was cancelled, cutting off access to services

and supplies (this ferry service was restored in 2006). Still, the community endured, and

when King was assassinated in 1968, two farmer mules from Gee’s Bend were chosen to

pull his casket. For over a century, the people of Gee’s Bend have come together to

overcome the struggles of poverty, isolation, and prejudice. Although Gee’s Bend

remains geographically remote, it is recognized worldwide as a center of artistic

production and a symbol of community perseverance and pride.

4

QUILTMAKING IN GEE’S BEND

The quiltmakers of Gee’s Bend first garnered attention for their skills in the 1960s, when

the Freedom Quilting Bee, a sewing cooperative that produced quilts and other sewn

products for department stores, was established. The Bee provided women with an

income and a sense of independence during the tumultuous Civil Rights era. In the

mid-1990s, while researching African American folk art in the South, art collector

William Arnett became interested in the history of quiltmaking. After seeing a

photograph of Gee’s Bend quiltmaker Annie Mae Young standing with one of her

quilts, he visited her and the other accomplished quiltmakers in the community.

Working together, they organized the acclaimed exhibition The Quilts of Gee’s Bend in

2002. The overwhelming positive response to the show led to a renaissance of

quiltmaking in the area. Since the 2002 exhibition, younger artists have been inspired to

pick up needle and thread and older quiltmakers who had abandoned the practice took

it up again. The current exhibition, Gee’s Bend: The Architecture of the Quilt, showcases

much of this new work. 

5

LET’S LOOK!

What shapes and patterns are

in this quilt?

This quilt is made of

corduroy. How do you think

it would feel to sleep under

it?

How are the blocks different

from each other? How are

they similar?

WILLIE “MA WILLIE” ABRAMS

American, 1879–1987

Roman Stripes Variation Quilt

c. 1975

Corduroy

85 1/2 x 70 1/2 inches (217.2 x 179.1 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



I believe she was quiet not because she didn’t have anything to say, but because she came

from a world where you did not speak until you were spoken to. I think this is also how she

was able to create many beautiful quilts . . . because in her moments of quietness she would

think of things to do and visualize it and just make it.

– Louise Williams, speaking about her grandmother, Willie Abrams



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Willie “Ma Willie” Abrams lived in Rehoboth, Alabama, a settlement north of Gee’s

Bend. She helped operate the Freedom Quilting Bee with her daughter, Estelle

Witherspoon, who served as its head manager for over two decades. Abrams is

remembered as a quiet person and gifted quiltmaker who often shared pattern blocks

and designs with others. Scholars have noted that the quiltmakers of Rehoboth have a

unique style, characterized by daring color combinations and innovative compositions.

This distinctive style might result in part from Rehoboth’s geographical distance from

the heart of Gee’s Bend.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

In 1972, the Freedom Quilting Bee received a contract

with Sears Roebuck and Company to make corduroy

pillow shams. The abundance of leftover fabric from that

project inspired many local quiltmakers to incorporate it

into their designs. Although difficult to work with due to

its rigidity, corduroy was well suited for minimal yet

bold designs. This quilt, made from Sears corduroy, has a

warm feeling due to the gold, red, and brown colors,

accented by avocado green. The design is dominated by a

variation of the Roman Stripes pattern, made of rows of

horizontal strips. However, Abrams rotated the rows

throughout the design and manipulated the size of each

block. One row of blocks near the middle of the quilt

features a sampling of other quilt patterns including

Bricklayer, Log Cabin, and Housetop. 

6

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary and Middle School – Poetry of Design

As a class, brainstorm words that can be used to describe the textures, colors, shapes,

and patterns in Abrams’s quilt. You can view the quilt together as a class by projecting

the image in the PowerPoint presentation (on the CD-ROM included with this resource

guide). Using the long list of words, have students create poems that capture the feeling

of the quilt.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Middle and High School – The Freedom Quilting Bee and the Civil Rights Movement

Abrams helped to manage the Freedom Quilting Bee, a sewing cooperative established

in 1966, which employed women in the Gee’s Bend and Rehoboth areas. They produced

quilts and other sewn pieces that were sold in department stores. Have students

research the history of the Freedom Quilting Bee and its relationship to the Civil Rights

Movement (see Nancy Callahan’s book on the subject, listed in “Additional Resources

for Study” on page 30).

MATH/ART

Elementary School – How Many Ways?

Ask students to put three rows of three dots on a piece of paper. Have them connect the

dots with straight lines in any way they like (just as long as the large square is

enclosed). Compare and contrast the solutions, then ask students to work on several

more designs. How many ways are there to divide up the square using the dots? What

happens if you add more dots to each row?

Elementary School – 100 Dots

Give students sheets of paper with 10 rows of 10 dots (100 dots total). Have students

connect the dots with straight lines to make a symmetrical design (they don’t have to

use every dot). Invite students to color in the entire design. Compare and contrast the

resulting compositions.

Elementary School – Variations on Quilt Patterns

Have students look at some of the different quilt patterns (see “Basic Building Blocks of

Quilts” on page 36). Then ask students to choose one that they’d like to reinterpret and

have them design a quilt with nine blocks (three rows of three blocks), with each block

featuring a variation of the quilt pattern they chose. Discuss how students altered the

original pattern in their designs.

7

LET’S LOOK!

If this quilt were a map or an

aerial view, what kind of

place could it be?

What colors did the artist

use? What do these colors

remind you of?

Bendolph says she bases

many of her designs on the

Housetop pattern. How does

this quilt remind you of that

pattern (see illustration on

page 36)?

LOUISIANA P. BENDOLPH

American, born 1960

Housetop Variation Quilt

2003

Cotton and cotton blends

97 1/2 x 66 3/4 inches (247.7 x 169.5 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



We came from cotton fields, we came through hard times, and we look back and see what all these

people before us have done. They brought us here, and to say thank you is not enough.

– Louisiana P. Bendolph



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Until she was sixteen, Louisiana Bendolph worked in the fields from sunup to sundown

every day of the week except Sunday, when she went to church with her family. She

and her husband Albert (whose mother is Mary Lee Bendolph) moved from Gee’s Bend

to Mobile, Alabama, in 1980, though she considers Gee’s Bend her home. She made

quilts intermittently throughout her life, at times using patterns from books. However,

she had not quilted for many years when she went to the 2002 opening of The Quilts of

Gee’s Bend exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. The exhibition inspired her

to return to quiltmaking. She said, “When I was coming back from Houston . . . I started

having visions of quilts . . . So I got a pencil and a piece

of paper and drew them out. Finally I decided that I

would get some fabric and make a quilt . . . The images

wouldn’t go away . . . And I’ve kept on doing it because

those images won’t leave me alone.”

ABOUT THIS QUILT

In this quilt, solid blocks of color alternate with blocks of

intersecting lines that recall maps, mazes, or grids. The

quilt as a whole looks like an aerial view of land, roads,

and fields. When Bendolph pieces her quilt tops together,

she often reworks their design by cutting them apart and

rearranging them in new ways. She describes most of her

designs as based on the Housetop pattern but as she

works on them they become “un-Housetop.” The

connection to her ancestors through quiltmaking is

important to her, and today her daughter and

granddaughter design quilt patterns on the computer.

8

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

High School – Are Quilts Art?

Can utilitarian quilts be considered art? Discuss arguments for and against the idea that

quilts should be exhibited in an art museum. Read art critics’ opinions as well, such as

the differing responses that critics Michael Kimmelman and Brooks Barnes had to The

Quilts of Gee’s Bend exhibition (listed in “Additional Resources for Study” on page 30).

SOCIAL STUDIES

Middle and High School – The Gee’s Bend Quilters Collective

The successful exhibitions of quilts from Gee’s Bend have created a renaissance in

quiltmaking and an increased demand for work done by these quiltmakers. Fifty local

women created the Gee’s Bend Quilters Collective in 2003 to sell their quilts. When a

quilt is sold, part of the income goes directly to the quiltmaker and the rest is

distributed among the members of the collective. Learn about how the collective works

and how it might serve as an example for other communities on the website

quiltsofgeesbend.com.

MATH

Elementary School – Patterns and Pattern Breaks

Using quilting tiles (available through the ETA/Cuisenaire website; see “Additional

Resources for Study” on page 30) or shapes cut out of construction paper (one-inch

squares and triangles cut from one-inch squares), have students create a clear pattern

within a nine-patch block (three rows of three squares). Then, have students exchange

patterns with a partner. The partner must change one or two pieces to break the overall

pattern and create visual interest. What changed? How does the pattern break affect the

design?

ART

Elementary and Middle School – Digital Quilt Designs

Louisiana Bendolph’s daughter and granddaughter create quilt designs on the

computer. Using Adobe Photoshop or another graphics editing program, have students

make quilt designs digitally and use them as inspiration in a quilt project.

Middle and High School – Aerial Views

Bendolph’s quilt recalls an aerial view of a landscape, including plots of land, roads,

and other geographic elements. Have students create designs based on aerial views of

their neighborhood, town, or city. 

9

LET’S LOOK!

If this quilt could make noise,

what would it be?

Describe some of the patterns

in this quilt.

How are the patterns

different from each other?

How are they similar?

Where have you seen similar

patterns in the world around

you?

MARY LEE BENDOLPH

American, born 1935

Blocks, Strips, Strings, and Half-Squares Quilt

2005

Cotton

84 x 81 inches (213.4 x 205.7 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



I can walk outside and look around in the yard and see ideas

all around the front and back of my house.

– Mary Lee Bendolph



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

The seventh of sixteen children, Mary Lee Bendolph has spent her entire life in Gee’s

Bend. She learned how to quilt from her mother, Aolar. Bendolph gave birth to her first

child at age fourteen, which prevented her from attending school beyond sixth grade.

She married Rubin Bendolph in 1955 and their family grew to include eight children.

Over the years, she has worked in a variety of textile-related jobs, mostly making army

uniforms. Since retiring in 1992, Bendolph has found more time to quilt. She gathers

design ideas by looking at the world around her. Anything—from people’s clothes at

church, to her barn, to quilts hanging on clotheslines in front yards, to how the land

looks when she’s high above it in an airplane—can inspire her. For her materials, she

prefers fabric cut from used clothing because it avoids

wastefulness and because she appreciates the “love and

spirit” in old cloth.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

Radiating energy and a lively rhythm, this quilt is made

of stacked blocks of pieced fabric, each presenting a

different design variation. The pattern changes are

sometimes referred to as syncopation, a term also used

to describe a rhythmic shift in music when a weak beat is

stressed. This quilt includes strings, or wedge-shaped

pieces, that are commonly used by quiltmakers in Gee’s

Bend, in addition to strips (long rectangles) and

triangles, which come together in various ways. Its

overall asymmetry defies predictability, encouraging our

eyes to jump to different areas of the quilt.

10

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

High School – “Crossing Over”

Read and discuss J. R. Moehringer’s Pulitzer Prize–winning story about Mary Lee

Bendolph, Gee’s Bend, and the reopening of the ferry service on the website

pulitzer.org/year/2000/feature-writing/works.

ART

Elementary and Middle School – Yard Art Show

Mary Lee Bendolph has talked about being inspired by neighbors’ and friends’ quilts

that were displayed in their front yards. She says:

We just walked out together, and the peoples have the quilts on the line. They have them hanging

out . . . And all the quilts they made, they had them hanging out on the wire fence, just like an

art show. They be looking so beautiful. I asked them about how they made them, you know, what

was the name of the quilt. They’d tell us. They named their own quilts and they’ll tell you about

it. And it would be so pretty.

Stage a “yard art show” of your own in a hallway, school yard, or other common area,

and have students respond to each others’ designs.

Middle and High School – Photography

After discussing the places where Bendolph finds inspiration for patterns, have

students find and photograph patterns—both symmetrical and asymmetrical—in their

neighborhood. Encourage students to look everywhere, as patterns emerge in

everything from a stone wall, to the bark of a tree, to links on a fence. Print the

photographs (if possible) or create designs based on these patterns.

MUSIC

Elementary and Middle School – Music

Many quiltmakers, including Bendolph, speak about the connection between music and

quiltmaking. Nettie Young explained:

We do lots of singing when we making a quilt, and it could have music and a song to it, because

that’s the way we make the quilt. Mostly singing . . . Sewing, singing, sewing and singing. It’s

in that quilt because that’s what I do when I quilt.

Ask students to discuss what kinds of music each quilt reminds them of. The quilts can

be viewed together as a class by projecting the image in the PowerPoint presentation

(on the CD-ROM included with this resource guide). Then, play songs from different

African American musical genres (such as ragtime, jazz, blues, or spirituals) and have

students respond visually. For ideas, consult Toyomi Igus’s and Michele Wood’s book

I See the Rhythm, or listen to recordings of songs recorded in Gee’s Bend in 1948 on the

website arts.state.al.us/actc/music/index-music.html.

11

LET’S LOOK!

What do you notice first?

Where does your eye travel

next? What drew your eye

there?

What do you think this quilt

could represent about the

artist’s childhood?

LORETTA P. BENNETT

American, born 1960

Two-Sided Geometric Quilt

2003

Corduroy and velveteen

69 1/2 x 59 inches (176.5 x 149.9 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



I came to realize that my mother, her mother, my aunts, and all the others from

Gee’s Bend had sewn the foundation, and all I had to do now was thread my

own needle and piece a quilt together.

– Loretta P. Bennett



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Loretta P. Bennett is the great-great-granddaughter of Dinah Miller, a woman who was

brought to Alabama from Africa as a slave in 1859. As a child, Bennett picked cotton

and other crops. She attended school in Gee’s Bend until seventh grade, when she was

bussed to high schools that were a two-hour drive away. Bennett was introduced to

sewing around age five by her mother, Qunnie, who worked at the Freedom Quilting

Bee, a sewing cooperative established in 1966 in the nearby neighborhood of Rehoboth.

She married Lovett Bennett in 1979. He enlisted in the U.S. Army and for the next

twenty years they lived in numerous places including Germany and Texas. However,

she always returned to Gee’s Bend to reconnect with family and quilt with her mother.

The 2002 exhibition of quilts from Gee’s Bend inspired her to reinvigorate her own

work.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

Bennett often sketches her ideas for quilts and colors them

before beginning to piece fabric together. While many

quilts are made up of numerous blocks, Bennett is known

for enlarging one block to the size of the quilt. She prefers

to use fabric from thrift stores due to the range of colors

and quality of older materials. In speaking about this quilt

she said, “The triangle I put in there to make the quilt

stand out, I wanted it to be like a window into my

background and my childhood and where I came from.

That quilt honors my mother, Qunnie, and Arlonzia.” She

decided to use hot pink fabric because it was her mother’s favorite color and used the

leftover pieces to make the back, which offers a simple, yet complementary, design.

Front of the quilt Back of the quilt

12

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary and Middle School – Family Traditions

Quiltmaking is a tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation in

Loretta Bennett’s family. Have a class discussion about traditions. What traditions do

the students have in their families? Do they do anything special on particular holidays,

or did a relative teach them to do something like bake, paint, or play a sport or musical

instrument? Have students write about a family tradition that has passed from one

generation to the next. Ask them to include details such as when the tradition began,

how it feels to be a part of that tradition, and what makes the tradition special.

You may also want to listen to an interview with quiltmaker Lucy Mingo and her

daughter, Polly Raymond, to learn about their family tradition of quiltmaking. The

interview can be found on the website arts.state.al.us/actc/1/radioseries.html.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Elementary, Middle, and High School – Oral History

After discussing Loretta Bennett’s quilt and how she took inspiration from her ancestors

for its design, begin a discussion about family and community history. What questions

do the students have about their own family or community history? Have students

conduct oral history interviews with a family or community member. Questions to ask

during the interview could be brainstormed by the class or taken from those developed

by NPR for their StoryCorps project, which can be found on the website

storycorps.net/record-your-story/question-generator/list. You could also record these

stories for StoryCorps.

MATH

Elementary and Middle School – Enlarging Images

Bennett is known for enlarging one quilt block to the size of the entire quilt. Have

students find an image from a magazine, newspaper, or art reproduction and draw a

grid of one-inch squares on it. Next, have them draw a larger square on a blank sheet of

paper, perhaps a two-, three-, or four-inch square. They can then choose an interesting

square from their gridded image to reproduce in this larger square. A discussion of

ratio and proportion can follow.

ART

Elementary, Middle, and High School – Visualizing History

After conducting an interview with a family or community member, have students

draw, paint, or collage a visual interpretation of their family or community history.

It can be abstract, like Bennett’s quilt, or include representational elements.

13

LET’S LOOK!

What moods or feelings do

these colors remind you of?

Where might you see colors

like the ones in this quilt?

Why might someone make a

quilt out of used clothes?

LUCY MINGO

American, born 1931

Blocks and Strips Work-Clothes Quilt

1959

Cotton and denim

78 3/4 x 69 1/4 inches (200 x 175.9 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



You know, we had hard times. We worked in the fields, we picked cotton, and sometimes we had

it and sometimes we didn’t. And so you look at your quilt and you say, “This is some of the old

clothes that I wore in the fields. I wore them out, but they’re still doing good.”

– Lucy Mingo



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Born in Rehoboth, a settlement just north of Gee’s Bend, Lucy Mingo grew up picking

crops, cooking for her family, and walking four miles to and from school each day. Her

father worked as a longshoreman in Mobile. Mingo married her husband, David, in

1949, and together they raised ten children. In 1965, she joined Dr. Martin Luther

King, Jr., on a march to Selma and also bravely registered to vote in Camden, Alabama,

with other residents of Gee’s Bend. In 2006, Mingo and her daughter, Polly Raymond,

received a Folk Arts Apprenticeship grant, given by the Alabama State Council on the

Arts, which matches master artists with apprentices. The grant covered the costs of

Mingo teaching her daughter how to quilt.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

This is a work-clothes quilt, also known as a “britches quilt,”

which is typically made from reused denim overalls, trousers

(britches), and cotton and flannel shirts. Looking closely at

this quilt, we can identify seams, pockets, and various shades

of blue where knees have left their mark. The light blues and

grays testify to a life of physical labor. The soft hues also

recall the environment in which the clothes were worn:

clouded skies, dusty roads, and fields of crops. In this way,

work-clothes quilts can be viewed as portraits of the people

who wore the clothes as well as of the time and place in which

they lived. They not only provide warmth, but also hold the

memory of long days in the fields. The transformation of worn-out work clothes into

objects of comfort and protection speaks to the strength of the human spirit to overcome

hardship. 

14

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary School – Objects Telling Stories

How do quilts tell stories? Lucy Mingo has said about quilts:

It looks like they have songs to them. You could tell stories about this piece, you could tell stories

about that piece . . . They have songs to them.

Discuss what you think Mingo means by her statement. What kinds of stories and songs

does this quilt convey? Ask students to think of an object at home that holds special

memories for them or tells an interesting story. Have them bring their object in, write its

story, and share with the class. The objects and stories could also be displayed together.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Elementary, Middle, and High School – The Civil Rights Movement

Lucy Mingo joined Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on a march to Selma, Alabama, where

she and other Civil Rights activists protested discrimination against African

Americans. Ask students to research Dr. King, his speeches, and the marches and

demonstrations he organized. What were the strategies, objectives, and outcomes? How

did the involvement of people like Lucy Mingo help to bring about social change?

Middle and High School – The Great Depression

Lucy Mingo was born in 1931, at the beginning of the Great Depression. This was a

time of hardship in Gee’s Bend due to the plummeting value of cotton. Have students

learn about this time period in history and its impact on rural areas such as Gee’s Bend.

Incorporate primary documents by having students visit the Library of Congress

website to study photographs of Gee’s Bend taken by U.S. government photographers

working for the Farm Security Administration: memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html;

enter “Gee’s Bend” in the search box. What can we learn from about life in Gee’s Bend

from these photographs? Why would the government have wanted to photograph

Gee’s Bend and other poor areas?

ART

Elementary and Middle School – Patchwork Quilts Using Recycled Materials

Have students bring in scraps of cloth from home, such as old shirts, jeans, ties, or other

fabric. Cut squares out of the usable parts, and have students sew or collage together

simple four-patch or nine-patch designs.

15

LET’S LOOK!

How are the blocks similar?

How are they different?

What shapes and patterns are

created in each block?

Discuss Pettway’s quote on

this page. How are the shapes

and patterns in this quilt

similar to a brick house?

LORETTA PETTWAY

American, born 1942

Bricklayer–Sampler Variation Quilt

1958

Cotton and corduroy

82 x 78 inches (208.3 x 198.1 cm)

Collection of the Tinwood Alliance

Photo by Stephen Pitkin, Pitkin Studio, Rockford, Illinois



I always did like a “Bricklayer.” It made me think about what I always wanted.

Always did want a brick house.

– Loretta Pettway



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Loretta Pettway has overcome many obstacles in her life. As a child she suffered

emotional pain when her mother abandoned her family. Pettway also faced physical

hardship, walking for miles each day and working in the fields. She endured a thirtyyear marriage to an abusive husband, with whom she had seven children. Like Loretta

P. Bennett, she is a descendent of Dinah Miller (Pettway is Dinah’s greatgranddaughter). She pieced her first quilt together when she was only eleven years old,

learning skills from her grandmother, stepmother, and other female relatives. Many of

them preferred the Bricklayer pattern. Pettway did not always enjoy sewing, as it was a

chore added to her heavy workload; now, her attitude has changed. Given all the

adversity that she has faced, Pettway’s brilliantly designed quilts reflect her personality

and strength.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

One of Pettway’s earliest quilts, this work is made of

twenty blocks, each one presenting a different variation

of the Bricklayer pattern. Her later quilts often focus on

this pattern but usually feature one large Bricklayer

block instead of many. Her husband, Walter, worked at

the Henry Brick Company in Selma, and Pettway

remembers being inspired by two picture boards of

bricks that he brought home. Each block in this quilt can

be interpreted as representing stacks of bricks, or

perhaps four sides of a house reaching a single peak. If

the blocks represent houses, perhaps the quilt as a whole

depicts a neighborhood. Pettway used a variety of solid colored and patterned fabrics

so that different shapes and patterns appear to emerge and recede throughout the quilt. 

16

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary School – Architecture

How are houses and quilts similar? Brainstorm some ideas together as a class. (For

example, both houses and quilts protect people from the cold, contain memories, and

include geometric shapes.) How else are they similar?

SOCIAL STUDIES

Middle and High School – Slavery’s Legacy in Gee’s Bend

Loretta Pettway and Loretta P. Bennett are both descendants of Dinah Miller, who was

brought to Alabama from Africa as a slave. Have students investigate slavery in Gee’s

Bend by listening to interviews from 1941 with former enslaved people on the Library

of Congress website: memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/voices/index.html; type

“Gee’s Bend” in the search box. Discuss the interviews as primary source documents.

What can we learn from them? What issues might have affected what the interviewees

did or did not say?

MATH/ART

Elementary School – Symmetry

The Bricklayer pattern has reflective symmetry (also called bilateral or mirror

symmetry), which means that the size, shape, and arrangement of parts of the left and

right sides, or the top and bottom of a composition or object are the same in relation to

an imaginary center dividing line. Discuss reflective symmetry and find other objects

that have reflective symmetry (such as a butterfly).

Middle and High School – Architecture

Many quiltmakers get pattern ideas from the buildings that they see in their everyday

lives. The names of some of the quilt patterns also refer to buildings, such as Log Cabin,

Bricklayer, and Housetop. What are the different ways that we can represent buildings

in a 2-D format? Have each student draw the plan of the school building (the floor plan

or footprint), the elevation of the building (what it looks like from the front), and a

section of the building (imagine you made a vertical slice into one side and expose the

inside). How do the drawings differ? What information do you get from each?

Have students choose a building in the community (their house, the school, or another

neighborhood building) and create a geometric design based on its plan, elevation, or

section. Alternatively, make a visual map of the neighborhood or town. For more

information on introducing architecture to students, see the Architecture in Education

website: aiaphila.org/aie. 

17

AFRICAN AMERICAN QUILTS IN THE

PHILADELPHIA MUSEUM OF ART’S

PERMANENT COLLECTION

INTRODUCTION

The Philadelphia Museum of Art’s textile collection includes examples by many leading

African American quiltmakers. A number of these quilts are on view in the current

exhibition:

QUILT STORIES: THE ELLA KING TORREY COLLECTION OF AFRICAN AMERICAN QUILTS AND

OTHER RECENT QUILT ACQUISITIONS

This exhibition is on view at the Museum’s Perelman Building from now through

February 2009.

Quilt Stories includes thirteen African American quilts collected by Ella King Torrey

(1957–2003), an innovative and dynamic arts leader in Philadelphia and San Francisco,

who had a long-standing interest in popular culture and folk art. While a graduate

student at the University of Mississippi she became especially interested in African

American quiltmaking. Her research and fieldwork included extensive interviews of

two of the quiltmakers included in the exhibition: Sarah Mary Taylor and Pearlie Posey.

Quilt Stories also features other recent Museum quilt acquisitions, such as an early

twentieth-century Amish quilt made in Arthur, Illinois, with a distinctive alternating

fan pattern, and an 1846 album quilt made by the Ladies of the Third Presbyterian

Church in Philadelphia. The album quilt was given to Mrs. Mary Brainerd, the wife of

the church’s pastor, as a measure of solace because their daughter had succumbed to

scarlet fever.

Three of the quilts in this guide are on view in the Quilt Stories exhibition—those by

Sarah Mary Taylor, Pearlie Posey, and the unknown quiltmaker from Gee’s Bend.

18

19

LET’S LOOK!

How do you think this

pattern relates to the pattern

name, “Birds in Flight?”

What shapes and patterns are

formed by the triangles?

How are the blocks similar?

How are they different?

Do you think that the artist

wants us to look at the quilt

as a whole, or just one part?

How do you know?

How is this quilt’s design

different than the other quilts

you’ve seen that were made

in Gee’s Bend?

UNKNOWN QUILTMAKER

“Triangles in Squares” Quilt

Gee’s Bend, Alabama

1970s

Cotton and polyester; running stitch

76 3/8 x 76 1/2 inches (194 x 194.3 cm)

Philadelphia Museum of Art: The Ella King Torrey Collection of

African American Quilts, 2006-163-4

ABOUT THIS QUILT

It is not known who made this quilt, but we do know it was made in Gee’s Bend. Its

back is made of red and blue corduroy remnants from pillow shams made by women at

the Freedom Quilting Bee for Sears Roebuck and Company, the same fabric that Willie

Abrams used in her quilt (see page 5). Some of the oldest surviving quilts in Gee’s Bend,

from the 1920s and 1930s, feature triangle patterns. Similar patterns are also found in

late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Euro-American patchwork quilts, as well

as in textiles and other surface adornments from West and

Central African groups. Although the exact origin of

triangle-based patterns in Gee’s Bend is unknown,

quiltmakers today agree that similar patterns have been

passed down for generations.

This quilt is made up of three rows of three blocks, each

featuring fifty triangles. The design is a variation of a quilt

pattern known as Birds in Flight or Birds in the Air. The

intricate pattern, consisting of many small pieces, would

have required a skilled and patient hand. Following the

direction of the triangles, our eyes bounce around from

one corner of the quilt to another, never finding a place to

rest. Similarly, migrating birds fly tirelessly to their new

home, pausing briefly before moving on again. Could

each triangle symbolize a single bird, and each block a

group traveling together? Or perhaps each small triangle

could represent a flock of birds, as the shape itself mimics

the arrangement of birds in flight. What do you think?

20

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary, Middle, and High School – Diamante Poems

Taking inspiration from the shapes and patterns in this quilt, have students create

diamond-shaped poems using the diamante poem format (see worksheet on page 37).

Discuss how patterns in language can respond to patterns in quilts.

High School – Gee’s Bend Performed at the Arden Theater

The play Gee’s Bend, written by Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder, will be performed at the

Arden Theater in Philadelphia from October 9–December 7, 2008. The play follows two

Gee’s Bend women who face segregation, family struggles, and the turmoil of the Civil

Rights Movement. Quilting provides comfort and context to their lives. Gee’s Bend is a

deeply personal story of family, self-discovery, and artistic expression.

MATH

Elementary School – Exploring Four-Patch Patterns

Using either quilting tiles (one-inch squares and triangles that have two one-inch sides;

available through ETA/Cuisenaire; their website is listed on page 32) or paper shapes

with the same dimensions, have students explore the variations of four-patch designs.

Each pair of students starts with twenty squares and twenty triangles (ten each of two

different colors). Have them experiment with ways to arrange the pieces in a two-bytwo square, making at least three different patterns. Groups then choose one design to

share with the class. Which designs are the same configuration of squares and triangles?

Remove duplicates and see how many different arrangements were found. Compare

the designs and the shapes created. You can also try three-by-three squares, allowing

for more design possibilities. Similar explorations can be pursued with sets of pattern

blocks, which include additional shapes such as hexagons and diamonds.

ART

Elementary, Middle, or High School – Capturing Flight in Art

How have other artists represented flight or movement? For example, compare and

contrast this quilt and Constantin Brancusi’s Bird in Space. What is each artist capturing

about birds and flight? Find Bird in Space and other examples on ARTStor (artstor.org)

and discuss similarities and differences. Have students create a work of art that

captures their idea of flying.

21

LET’S LOOK!

What are some of the animals

in this quilt? What are they

doing?

How would you describe the

mood of this quilt? What do

you see that makes you say

that?

What are some strategies that

the artist used to make the

different animals stand out?

PEARLIE POSEY

American, 1894–1984

“Animals” Quilt

1980–83

Cotton; running stitch

76 1/4 x 62 1/2 inches (193.7 x 158.8 cm)

Philadelphia Museum of Art: The Ella King Torrey Collection of African

American Quilts, 2006-163-7



In my time, would be a family there and a family there and a family there and we would get

together and tear up old clothes, overall and linings and everything and piece quilt tops and

linings . . . If I was ready to quilt one, well, four or five women Sunday morning come to my

house and put one in. That’s the way we quilted, just quilt and laugh and enjoy ourselves.

– Pearlie Posey



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Pearlie Posey lived a life of physical labor, spending her days working on plantations in

Mississippi and her evenings taking care of her family. She suffered the loss of her

mother at age five and was raised by her grandparents. Nonetheless, her mother spent

time at the end of her life sewing quilt tops so that she could provide warmth and love

for her daughter even after she was gone. Later in life, Posey’s grandmother taught her

how to make pieced quilts such as nine-patch, four-patch, and strip quilts. Material

and thread were scarce, so they used what they had, obtaining thread by unraveling

flour and meal sacks.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

Although Posey made pieced quilts for many years,

she was inspired by her daughter, Sarah Mary Taylor

(see page 25), to make appliqué quilts toward the end

of her life. Due to her failing eyesight, she would have

Taylor cut out the forms, then she’d group the figures

together on blocks of fabric, often varying their

arrangement in each section. Posey created lively

quilts and became known for her use of bright colors.

In this quilt, animals run, play, and gather together.

Each block seems like an excerpt from a larger story.

Posey’s use of contrasting colors and values adds to

the animated feeling of the quilt.

22

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary School – Valerie Flournoy’s The Patchwork Quilt

Read this story and discuss what the quilt means to Tanya, her grandmother, and the

other members of their family.

Elementary School – Stories

As a class, imagine Posey’s quilt is a storybook, with each square showing a different

scene in the narrative. You can view the quilt together as a class by projecting the image

in the PowerPoint presentation (on the CD-ROM included with this resource guide).

Brainstorm how all of the scenes in the quilt fit together, or have individual students

determine what is happening in each quilt block, then tie them together into one long

story as a class.

Middle and High School – Alice Walker’s short story, Everyday Use

Have students read Alice Walker’s short story Everyday Use. Discuss the characters’

sense of their heritage and their relationships to the quilts. What are the arguments for

giving the quilts to Dee or to Maggie? Why do you think Mama makes the decision that

she does at the end of the story?

ART

Elementary School – Appliqué Quilt

Have students draw animals or people in interesting poses, either from images in

magazines and newspapers, or from life. Make templates of the images, trace them onto

cloth, and cut them out. Ask students to create a scene with the figures by applying

them to a background square of cloth with stitches, glue, or a double stick fusible web

product such as Steam-A-Seam 2 Double Stick (available at craft stores), which attaches

pieces of fabric together with the heat of an iron. Taking inspiration from Posey’s quilt,

assemble the students’ blocks together in a class quilt. 

23

LET’S LOOK!

Can you find Cassie in a red

dress? How many times do

you see her? Where?

Where is this story taking

place? How do you know?

How is this different from

other quilts you’ve seen?

How is it similar?

FAITH RINGGOLD

American, born 1930

“Tar Beach 2” Quilt

1990

Silk

66 x 67 inches (167.6 x 170.2 cm)

Philadelphia Museum of Art: Purchased with funds contributed by

W. B. Dixon Stroud, 1992-100-1



I think most people understand quilts and not a lot of people understand paintings. But yet

they're looking at one. When they're looking at my work, they're looking at a painting and

they're able to accept it better because it is also a quilt.

– Faith Ringgold



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Born in Harlem (a neighborhood in New York City) in 1930, Faith Ringgold grew up in

the wake of the Harlem Renaissance. As a girl, she was often bedridden with asthma

and spent time drawing while she rested. She taught art in city public schools from

1955–73, pursuing a career as a painter simultaneously. She had her first solo show in

1967, which featured paintings that dealt with Civil Rights and other political issues. In

the 1970s, she began to create sculptures made of cloth in collaboration with her mother,

Willi Posey Jones, who was a successful fashion designer. Soon Ringgold developed the

idea for “story quilts,” pieced quilts with narratives written and illustrated on their

surfaces. She has also written and illustrated eleven children’s

books, which have received numerous awards.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

When she was growing up, Ringgold and her family often

spent summer evenings on the roof of their apartment

building. This childhood memory served as the impetus for a

series of story quilts, the first made in 1988, and her book Tar

Beach, which was published in 1991. Tar Beach 2 features

images of Cassie, the protagonist in the story, on her

building’s roof with her family and neighbors. In the story,

she dreams of flying, a symbol of freedom and power. Here,

she soars over the George Washington Bridge. Ringgold used

a quilting pattern of eight triangles within a square, derived

from a traditional design of the Kuba peoples of Africa. She made this quilt using the

screenprinting process at The Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia. It is one

of an edition of twenty-four.

24

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary School – Flying

Have the students imagine that they can fly above their neighborhood, town, or city.

Ask them where they would go, what they would see, and what it would feel like. Have

them write a story about their adventures as they soared above it all.

Elementary School – Tar Beach

Read and discuss Tar Beach. How does this quilt relate to the story? Compare and

contrast the images in the book to those in this quilt. How does this quilt add to the

story? View the quilt together as a class by projecting the image in the PowerPoint

presentation (on the CD-ROM included with this resource guide).

Middle School – Childhood Memories as Inspiration

Ringgold used her memory of going to the roof of her building as inspiration for her

story. What special memories do the students have from childhood of a special place or

family tradition? Have them write a short story about this memory.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Middle and High School – American Labor Unions

In the story, Cassie’s father is prevented from joining the union because he is African

American. Research the history of African Americans and labor unions. When were the

unions in your area integrated? What were the reasons given why African Americans

could not join? Who were some of the leaders who helped change the situation? What

problems still exist?

ART

Elementary School – Illustrating a Story with One Image

After reading a story, have each student make one illustration to summarize the story.

Ask them what they will include and what they will leave out. Have them decide how

to convey the plot of the story through one image.

Middle and High School – Fabric Art

Ringgold transformed her art by using fabric to make sculptures and creating pieced

cloth borders around her painted canvases and quilting the entire work. Have the

students experiment with using fabric to make works of art such as sculptures, collages,

and paintings.

25

LET’S LOOK!

Describe some of the color

combinations in this quilt.

Are any two blocks the same?

Why might the artist have

paired certain colors

together?

Why might she have chosen

the image of hands to repeat?

What kind of mood do the

hands create?

What could the hands

represent?

SARAH MARY TAYLOR

American, 1916–2000

“Hands” Quilt

1980

Pieces and appliquéd cotton and synthetic solid and printed plain weave,

twill flannel, knit, dotted swiss, and damask

83 1/4 x 78 inches (211.5 x 198.1 cm)

Philadelphia Museum of Art: The Ella King Torrey Collection of African

American Quilts, 2006-163-11



Every time I piece one I tries to make something different from what I made.

I don’t want what I been piecing; let me find something different.

– Sarah Mary Taylor



ABOUT THIS ARTIST

Known for her use of vibrant colors and bold designs, Sarah Mary Taylor inherited a

love of quilting from both her mother, Pearlie Posey (see page 21), and her aunt, Pecolia

Warner. Her mother taught her how to quilt at a young age, but Taylor didn’t make a

quilt of her own until she was married and left her mother’s house. She was married

five times, but never had children. She lived on plantations throughout the Mississippi

Delta, working as a cook, a field hand, and a housekeeper. For many years, Taylor made

pieced quilts out of the skirts of long dresses, but began making appliqué quilts in

1980 after her aunt Pecolia received attention for her work

from a professor at the University of Mississippi. Taylor

soon gained recognition for her appliqué quilts as well.

ABOUT THIS QUILT

To create her quilts, Taylor drew shapes on paper and cut

out templates for the appliqué pieces. She gathered design

ideas from images she saw in magazines, newspapers,

catalogues, and from objects she encountered in her

everyday life. She added the appliqué shapes onto squares

of fabric and combined them together with vertical strips.

She arranged the blocks in a way that was visually striking

to her, often resulting in energetic compositions. Taylor’s

appliqué quilts were typically not used and instead were

sold, given away to friends, or stored. A version of this

“Hands” quilt was commissioned for the film adaptation

of Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple. 

26

CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

LANGUAGE ARTS/ENGLISH

Elementary School – Expression in Hands

How do hands express emotion? Discuss what emotions are expressed in the

outstretched hands in this quilt. What other emotions can we express with our hands?

Have a brainstorming session and write about what each hand gesture can

communicate. As an extension, have students design quilt blocks with their own hand

gestures and combine them together in a class quilt.

High School – The Color Purple

A version of this quilt was commissioned for the film adaptation of Alice Walker’s

novel The Color Purple. Have the class read the novel and discuss what sewing and

quilts symbolize in the story.

MATH

Elementary School – Variations

After discussing the different color combinations of hands and background colors,

explore similar permutations using colored paper squares and circles. Give each student

two squares of different colors and two circles of different colors. How many different

design variations can you make (four)? Then try with additional squares and circles.

How can you prove that you’ve found all of the possible variations?

ART

Elementary School – Color Combinations

While looking at the quilt, discuss which hands stand out. What color combinations

make the hands pop out the most? Why could this be? Discuss ideas such as

complementary colors, value, and contrast. Using a wide range of colored paper, have

the students create collages in which they produce vibrant color combinations that

make different shapes stand out.

27

SELECTED CHRONOLOGY

Gee’s Bend United States History

1808

The direct importation of slaves from Africa to the

United States is banned, although it continues illegally

for decades.

1816

Joseph Gee purchases land and establishes a cotton

plantation in Gee’s Bend.

1819

Alabama becomes a state.

1824

Joseph Gee dies and his heirs contest the inheritance

of his plantation.

1831

1845 Nat Turner leads a slave revolt in Virginia.

Mark Pettway buys the plantation from the Gee

family and brings 100 of his slaves from North

Carolina to Gee’s Bend.

1859

Dinah Miller, Gee’s Bend’s earliest identified

quiltmaker, was brought to Alabama on an outlaw

slave ship from Africa.

1861–65

The Civil War

1861

Mark Pettway dies.

1863

President Abraham Lincoln signs the Emancipation

Proclamation, declaring all slaves in rebellious areas to

be free.

1880

Gee’s Bend becomes the property of Mark Pettway’s

son, John Henry.

1870

The Fifteenth Amendment, guaranteeing all citizens the

right to vote, is ratified.

1875

Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which

bans discrimination in places of public accommodation.

1895

John Henry sells approximately 4,000 acres of the

old Pettway plantation to the Dew family.

1896

The Supreme Court rules in Plessy v. Ferguson that

“separate but equal” facilities for blacks and whites is

constitutional.

1900

Adrian Van de Graff buys the entire property from

the Dews. After his death, his son inherits the land.

He later sells it to the Roosevelt Administration.

1909

The National Association for the Advancement of

Colored People (NAACP) is formed.

28

Gee’s Bend United States History

1914–18

World War I

Late 1920s

The price of cotton plummets. Merchants in

Camden advance credit to Gee’s Bend farmers,

many of whom fall into debt.

1929

The stock market crashes and the Great Depression

begins.

1920–30s

The Harlem Renaissance

1932

Collectors foreclose on Gee’s Bend debtors, seizing

everything they own. Many residents of Gee’s Bend

face near-starvation.

1933

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issues New Deal

reforms in order to relieve the economic strife caused by

the Great Depression.

1934–35

The Federal Emergency Relief Administration

provides some relief to Gee’s Bend residents by

giving them seeds, fertilizer, farming tools,

livestock, and loans.

1939–45

World War II

1937 and 1939

U.S. photographers Arthur Rothstein and Marion

Post are sent by the Farm Security Administration

to Gee’s Bend to photograph the community.

1937–40

Approximately 100 Roosevelt Project Houses are

built in Gee’s Bend. Other buildings constructed

include a school, store, cotton gin, mill, and a clinic.

1941

Robert Sonkin documents traditional spirituals,

sermons, and singing groups in Gee’s Bend for the

Library of Congress.

1945

The federal government offers Gee’s Bend residents

loans to buy farmland.

1955

Activist Rosa Parks is arrested in Montgomery,

Alabama, when she refuses to give her seat on the bus to

a white man.

1962

A dam and lock are constructed on the Alabama

River, just south of Gee’s Bend, flooding much of

Gee’s Bend’s best farming land.

1963

Martin Luther King, Jr., gives his “I Have a Dream”

speech in Washington, D.C. to 200,000 activists who

participated in the historic March on Washington.

29

Gee’s Bend United States History

1965

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., visits Gee’s Bend and

preaches at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. Many

residents march with him to Selma and register to

vote in nearby Camden. Many of these people lose

their jobs after marching or registering to vote.

Ferry service from Gee’s Bend to Camden is

terminated.

1964

President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of

1964, which outlaws discrimination in housing,

employment, and education.

The U.S. begins to bomb Vietnam.

1966

The Freedom Quilting Bee is established in

Rehoboth (just north of Gee’s Bend).

1968

Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated. Mules from

Gee’s Bend pull his casket through Atlanta.

Mid-1970s

Water and telephone service is established

throughout Gee’s Bend.

1973

The United States withdraws troops from Vietnam.

2002

The Quilts of Gee’s Bend exhibition opens at the

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and then travels to

the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

Eleven more museums sign on to host the show.

2003

Fifty local women found the Gee’s Bend Quilters

Collective.

2006

Ferry service from Gee’s Bend to Camden reopens.

The U.S. Postal Service issues ten postage stamps

commemorating Gee’s Bend quilts.

Gee’s Bend: The Architecture of the Quilt is organized.

30

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES FOR STUDY

BOOKS AND ARTICLES

Arnett, Paul, Joanne Cubbs, and Eugene W. Metcalf, Jr., eds. Gee’s Bend: The Architecture

of the Quilt. Atlanta: Tinwood Books, 2006.

Barnes, Brooks. “Museums Cozy Up to Quilts.” Wall Street Journal, August 23, 2002, sec.

W. 12.

Beardsley, John and William Arnett, Paul Arnett, Jane Livingston. Gee’s Bend: The

Women and Their Quilts. Atlanta: Tinwood Books in association with The

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2002.

Beardsley, John and William Arnett, Paul Arnett, Jane Livingston, Alvia Wardlaw. The

Quilts of Gee’s Bend. Atlanta: Tinwood Books in association with The Museum of

Fine Arts, Houston, 2002.

Benberry, Cuesta. Always There: The African-American Presence in American Quilts.

Louisville, Kentucky: The Kentucky Quilt Project, Inc., 1992.

Brackman, Barbara. Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns. Paducah, Kentucky: American

Quilter’s Society, 1993.

Callahan, Nancy. The Freedom Quilting Bee: Folk Art and the Civil Rights Movement in

Alabama. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press, 1987.

Kimmelman, Michael. “Jazzy Geometry, Cool Quilters,” New York Times, November 29,

2002, sec. B, 31.

LITERATURE FOR CHILDREN AND YOUNG ADULTS

Flournoy, Valerie. The Patchwork Quilt. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers, 1985.

Igus, Toyomi and Michele Wood. I See the Rhythm. San Francisco, California: Children’s

Book Press, 1998.

Mckissack, Patricia. Stitchin’ and Pulllin’: A Gee’s Bend Quilt. New York: Random House,

2008. (to be released October 28, 2008)

Ringgold, Faith. Tar Beach. New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1991.

Walker, Alice. Everyday Use. In In Love & Trouble. Orlando, Florida: Harcourt, Inc., 1967. 

31

WEB

Gee’s Bend

 The Library of Congress’ American Memory website has photographs of Gee’s Bend

from the 1930s (search for “Gee’s Bend”):

memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html

 A lesson plan based on the photographs of Gee’s Bend from the 1930s:

memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/lessons/98/grand/geesbend.html

 “Voices from the Days of Slavery” has recordings and transcripts of interviews with

former slaves from 1941 (do a search for “Gee’s Bend”):

memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/voices/index.html

 Quilters Collective History:

quiltsofgeesbend.com

 Four 1948 recordings of gospel music from Gee’s Bend:

arts.state.al.us/actc/music/index-music.html

 Interview with Lucy Mingo and her daughter Polly Raymond (scroll to find):

arts.state.al.us/actc/1/radioseries.html

 J. R. Moehringer’s Pulitzer Prize–winning story “Crossing Over:”

pulitzer.org/works/2000,Feature+Writing

 Michael Kimmelman’s review of the 2002 exhibition The Quilts of Gee’s Bend:

query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9900E6DF1238F93AA15752C1A9649C8B63

 Gee’s Bend play at the Arden Theater (October 9–December 7, 2008):

ardentheatre.org/2009/geesbend.html

Stories

 StoryCorps (National Public Radio) project; resource for conducting interviews:

storycorps.net

 Share the story of your quilt on the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s website:

philamuseum.org/exhibitions/311.html?page=5

Quilts

 Leigh Fellner refutes claims about the quilt codes that some believe to have been

used on the Underground Railroad:

ugrrquilt.hartcottagequilts.com

32

 A website dedicated to the PBS film The Art of Quilting has teacher resources, lesson

plans, and interviews. PBS also produced two other films, A Century of Quilts and

America Quilts, and there are links to those programs on the website:

pbs.org/americaquilts

 ETA/Cuisenaire sells Quilting Tiles:

etacuisenaire.com

 The Illinois State Museum’s “Keeping Us in Stitches: Quilts & Quilters” is a list of

quilt-based activities, lesson plans, and interactive online exercises for students:

museum.state.il.us/muslink/art/htmls/ks_actres.html

 Faith Ringgold’s website:

faithringgold.com

Images

 ARTstor is a database of high quality art images. You can search without a

membership and can download images with a membership, which can be obtained

for free by registering at the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Wachovia Education

Resource Center, located in the Perelman Building (philamuseum.org/education/33-

530-416.html).

artstor.org

VIDEO

Carey, Celia. The Quiltmakers of Gee’s Bend. Alabama Public Television in association

with Hunter Films, 2004. DVD.

33

VOCABULARY

Appliqué quilt — A quilt with a top made of cut-out pieces of fabric that have been

sewn on top of background fabrics. “Appliqué” is the French word for “applied.”

Asymmetry — A lack of exact repetition between the opposite sides of a form.

Back — The underside of a quilt.

Batting — The soft middle layer of a quilt that is between the top and the back. It is

usually made of cotton and provides warmth.

Birds in Flight pattern — See “Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

Block — A rectangular or square section of a quilt.

Bricklayer pattern — See “Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

Civil Rights Movement — A movement that aimed to abolish racial discrimination

against African Americans. It occurred from 1955–68.

Complementary colors — Pairs of contrasting colors: red and green, yellow and violet,

blue and orange.

Contrast — A design principle that involves the use of opposite effects or shapes near

each other to add tension or drama to a work of art.

Elevation — A drawing of the outside walls of a building (the front, back, and each of

the sides).

Farm Security Administration (FSA), Office of War Information — A program created

as part of the New Deal whose goal was to combat rural poverty. The FSA was first

created as the Resettlement Administration. Its photography program (1935–44)

documented the challenges of rural poverty.

Four-patch pattern — A square quilt block made of two rows of two squares; see “Basic

Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

Freedom Quilting Bee — A sewing cooperative established in Rehoboth (just north of

Gee’s Bend) in 1966 that employed women from the local area who produced quilts and

other sewn products for department stores in the North.

34

Great Depression — An era in U.S. history defined by an economic downturn, which is

often associated with the stock market crash on October 29, 1929.

Harlem Renaissance — A movement, centered in the Harlem neighborhood of New

York City, in which artists, philosophers, and other intellectuals found new ways to

explore the experiences of African Americans. The movement, which lasted from the

1920–30s, produced a wealth of literature, drama, music, visual art, dance, as well as

new ideas in sociology, historiography, and philosophy.

Housetop pattern — See “Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

Log Cabin pattern — See “Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

New Deal — The name that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave to the programs

he initiated from 1933–38. These programs aimed to relieve poverty, help the economy

recover, and reform the financial system during the Great Depression in the United

States.

Nine-patch pattern — A square quilt block made of three rows of three squares; see

“Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

Pieced quilt; Patchwork quilt — A quilt whose top is made from bits of fabric stitched

together to form patterns and borders often with a geometric motif.

Piecing — The process of stitching together separate pieces of fabric to create a larger

cloth, such as a quilt top.

Plan — A view of a room or building that is seen as if the roof has been removed and

someone is above the building looking straight down onto the rooms (also called a floor

plan).

Quilting — The sewing that holds the top layer, the middle filling layer (batting), and

the bottom layer (back). It makes the quilt more durable and also traps air between the

layers of cloth, which provides insulation and warmth.

Reflective symmetry (also called bilateral or mirror symmetry) — When the size, shape,

and arrangement of parts of the left and right sides or the top and bottom of a

composition or object are the same in relation to an imaginary center dividing line.

Roman Stripes pattern — See “Basic Building Blocks of Quilts” on page 36.

35

Screenprinting — A process that uses a fine cloth mesh stretched over a frame, with

parts of the mesh sealed, to create an image (often using stencils). Ink is pushed through

the unsealed areas onto paper or fabric underneath, creating a screenprinted image.

Section — A view of the interior of a room or building that is seen as if the building has

been cut in half and someone is looking straight into the interior.

Strings —A term used among Gee’s Bend quiltmakers to describe wedge-shaped pieces

of fabric.

Strip quilt — A type of pieced quilt made by sewing long rectangular pieces of cloth

together to make a quilt top.

Syncopation — A temporary displacement of the regular metrical accent in music

caused typically by stressing the weak beat; in quiltmaking, a break in pattern.

Top — The side of the quilt that is presented outward.

Work-clothes quilt — A quilt made of reused work clothes such as denim pants and

overalls, and cotton or flannel shirts.

Value — Degree of lightness on a scale of grays from black to white.

36

BASIC BUILDING BLOCKS OF QUILTS

Four-Patch

Log Cabin

Housetop — also called

Pig in a Pen, Hog Pen, or

Chicken Coop

Birds in Flight

(many variations)

Bricklayer — also known

as Courthouse Steps

Roman Stripes

Nine-Patch

37

(This activity is related to the quilt made by an unknown quiltmaker from Gee’s Bend; see

Language Arts/English Connection, page 20)

Diamante poem format:

_______________________________

Line 1: one word (subject/noun) that is contrasting to line 7

___________________________________________________________

Line 2: two words (adjectives) that describe line 1

______________________________________________________________________

Line 3: three words (action verbs) that relate to line 1

______________________________________________________________________________

Line 4: four words (nouns), first 2 words relate to line 1, last 2 words relate to line 7

______________________________________________________________________

Line 5: three words (action verbs) that relate to line 7

___________________________________________________________

Line 6: two words (adjectives) that describe line 7

_______________________________

Line 7: one word (subject/noun) that is contrasting to line 1

Gloria lIoppilltl: medalflOIl dellign, roo 1975,

rorr/llrQlI, 9/ 111188 illthn .

AfI880,trl Pell.roll: Hlotu and ,trip, work·dothe, quilt, f9U', rottOIl,

rordUrrJII, rolloll llad;/lIg material, 90 b:., .:. ",---;...

104 Oclob6r2003

Gee's

Bend

Modern

The isolated Alabama community of

Gee's Bend has long nurtured a quilting

tradition that resonates deeply with aspects

of modernist abstmction. Now the quilts

are the subject of an exhibition that is

touring u.s. musemns.

BY RICHARD KALINA

I

t is a given that most museum shows of recent an serve to ratify accepted tastes and standards. A Johns or Flavin retrospective, or a survey of Fluxus art, while certainly deepening our

knowledge of the subject, is not about to change perceptions significantly. f)'en a large·scale re\icw of a first-rate but underappreciated artist-the still traveling Joan Mitchell retrospecth'e,

for example--essentially rearranges lhe pieces on the board. It

is rare to find an exhibition that throws something totally unexpected our way, that forces us to can'e out. a meaningl'ul chunk

of historical space to make room for a new body of work. "The

QUillS of Gee's Bend," organized by the Museum of Pine Arts,

Houston, and shown last winter at the Whitney Museum, does

just that.

The 60 quilts in the exhibition were made by a group of women

in a small, isolated fa rming community in central Alabama,

southwest of Selma. Gee's Bend was and is an almost exclusively

Mrica n-American hamlet. Surrounded on three sides by the

Alabama River, is virtually an island; after the residents began

to assert their civil rights in the 1960s, its feny sen'ice was terminated (Ilrobably not coincidentally), and its one access road,

some 15 miles from the nearest highway, remained unpaved

until 1967. Today the area is starting to become more connected

with the outside world, and is at the same time losing its quilting

tradition. The town's isolation during the '50s, '60s and '70s-the

period when most of the quilts in the exhibition were donemade it nearly imllOssible for the quilters to have been eXllOsed

in any conlextualized or coherent way to modern art, although

images of abstract art or design may ha\'c crossed their paths via

magazines and neWSllapers,' And yet these works seem io resonate harmonically wit h many strands of

and materially innovative postwar American abstraction, as well

as with that abstraction's European antecedents. 

Although the Gee's Bend quilters were not part of the mai nstream

art world, it is important to understand that they formed an art world

of their own, that is, a coherent social groulling dedicated to the con·

strucUon of a visual language. They shared a sense of esthetic lincage

(patterns and ways of worki ng were handed down through extended

fam il ies and known to the rest. of the community), a recognized

means of display (the quilts were hung out on clotheslines not just Lo

dry, bUl to be seen), a concern wilh the interplay of individual and

collahorative work and, importantly, a set of common limi ts. The

women knew each other and were onen related-of the 41 artists in

the show, 18 belong to the Pellway family, which Look its name from

wtUha I't ttlCQlI' quill, en. 1950, dtlliM, cottOIl,

8(J b,lBf illcllt •. All plioltn tAU arlicle Piti/" Studio, Rodiford, l/I.

the area's principal sla\'e·owner, Religion also played a vit..'ll, unifyi ng

role in the Jives of Gee's Benders. The Baptist. church was the place

where people not only Ilfayed but organized their community and

exchanged information, including ideas about sewing and qUilting.2 lt

is clear that Gee's Bend quilters were neither insular Yisionaries pursuing idiosyncratic personal paths, nor were they simply the skilled

passers-on of traditional forms, Instead, they were like other artists of

their time, adept, committed practitioners engaged ill a measured and

ongoi ng esthetic give-and-take.

Arlill Amen'Go

, 

The quillS of Gee's Bend are quite unlike the quilts .... 'e are 1.JSCd to seeing--eilhcr the traditional or contempomry high-end ones, or the

homey items readily a\'ailabJe in stores or yant sales. Bold and decIar.uh.'C in

design, material and ronnat, they looked perfectly at ease on the Whitney's

InU, .... 'hite \mlls. While it is possible 10 wlderst:tnd the Gee's Bend quillS in

the context of vernacular an., outsider IU1 or craft, they are more than that.

n "IC ir UUlO\'atr.-e power, combined .... iUl the restraints imposed by n4'l1crial,

time and a compressed Iocal lradilion, argue for their examination as cullUrally infonnt'(l ruld emolionally tl\'OCIttivuJOI"mal objects.

To do so mighl seem like treading on dangerous ground. The histOlY of

2Oth-cenlury art. is rife with attempts to rev "ll the contempordl'}' and

cosmopolit .. m with the raw power of the art of Africa, Oceania or the

Amenclls, to infuse sophisticated studio products .... ith the artlessness of

children or the skewed sensibilities of the insane. In this way, "high art"

can be bolstered by the art of the Other I and the transacUon rendered

morally frictionless by decontexlualization In the ostensibly neutral

space of a museum or gallery. TIle classic example of this was the 1984

exhibition '''PrimitMsm' in1\\'enlieth·CentUlY Art: Affinity of the Tribal

and the Modern" at New York's Museum of Modem Art. The l)(llemics

106 (klober 2003

Rathtl Cartll G«Jrgt': On, 6id, 010 two-Md«1lWrk.cli:lthtt quill, NI. 1935,

dtnim, ItOOl tnlUJIUfl, matlnu tickilli, tOIIOII, 'l2 111182 /J,,:ht •.

occasioned by that show, most notably Thomas McEvilley's article

Lawyer, Indian Chief" (Arifonml, November 1084), made the

art. .... -o rld considerably more aware of iLs ethnocentrism. It seems, as if to

compensate for past errors, that we mo\'ed in the Olher directionlowards an o\'er-contcxtualization (marked by the proliferation of W'.ul

text and SUJllllcmenlmy material) that serves to cocoon Ihe Objl.'Cts in

(Iucstion and can, in its own W8,)', be erery bi!. as condescending. I am

scarcely ad\'OCating cultural but mther noting that too

much stage-setting and explanation can reinforce the dichotomy of cen· trality and marginality.

Things, however, may have changed again, and this exhibition can be

seen as one clement of an expanded frame of reference for both the mak·

ing and viewing of art. The art. we look at now comes from far more

places physically, conceptually and emotionally than it did before. This

decentralization, evident in the diversity of image-based art, 81>]llies to

abstraction as well; ror abstraction, by virtue of its looser mimetic

anchoring to the world around it, is particularly able to cliSL itselr in a 

Used clothing is scarcely a neutral

art material. Not only does it embrace

a range of social signs, but it can also

carry the physical imprint of the wearer.

variety of Comls, to entertain mulUple readings. The Gee's Bend quillS

are exemplars of that broadened approach to abstraction. Their allusive

complexlty-their scale, their reference to the body, to physical work, to

social structures and to the land-greaUy enriches our perception of

them. But there is something else. The quillS are remarkably powerful

and compelling visual statements.. They declare themsehoes viscerally,

directly. I beJie\'e that they are entitled, e\'ery bit as much as a Frank

Stella or a Kenneth Noland painting of that period, to lay claim to an

unfettered optical reading as well, in other words. to participate fully in

the esthetics of modernism.

One of the things that makes ordinruy quilts so likable is the way

that they (:yJlicaJly frame a wealth of detail in smallish, repealing

patterns. You can look at a part of U1CIll and easily deduce the whole.

There may be some framing devices. but essentially the pattern could

repeat endlessly. The Gee's Bend Quilts don't do thaL They are bounded,

unique and rareJy symmetrical. Even when symmetry is there, it is given

a sawy, destabHi7.ing push. In Gloria lIoppins's "Housetop" pattern quill

(ca. 1975), for example, she inserts one thin \llrtical red stripe on the

lelt-hand side or the orange center portion or a set or off-kilter nestled

AllnffJ MOfJ Young: emln' "'Mollion IIlrl/Ullrlfh bordUff, rn. /965,

rollOIl, r.orrturoll, IIl1fJeling, II!OOI, 91 bll 81

LorttlD PtttlU/r. "Log "",WIock mriadoll, rn.. 1970, de"u.., Sf

squares. I That stripe Sl1.111S the quilt into place, as does the dark \-ertlcal

denim band by three smaller, similarly colored edge piCCi!S in

Lorraine Pettway's light gray medallion pallerned quilt or 1974.

Identified by three alternate pattern names, Lorella Pettway's "Log

Cabin-Courthouse (ca. 1970) juxtaposes a stepped

series or vertical dark blue pieces edged in white .... ith similarly sized

light blue pieces on the horizontal. The pieces get smaller as they

approach the center, creating the look or one-point perspective. The

however, warp, and their thickness is ne'l'e.r unifonn. So instead of

being locked-in and static, the composition opens up and mO\'e:S. It disthe wit and whimsical \'3.riation or a Paul Klee architectural rantasy, with logic used, paradoxically, to subvert order. It is almost as if symmetry in the Gee's Bend quHts is a condition established precisely so that

it may be creatively violated.

If symmetry is import.nnl in traditional quilts, a more or less evenly

weighted display or detail seems equally asential. Detail in {he Goo's Bend

quilts functions differently. Rather than being the substance or the quilt, it

more often than noL, an accent, a fillip or a fonnal destabilizer. Slmllie

\ocrtical and horiwnlal forms tend to predominate, and since quilting Is an

addith'e process, a reasonably srrd.ightfrnward design can be gi\'en piquan·

cy and personality by sewing in something small and unexpected. In

Arlorula Pettway's Gal (Bars)t" ca 1975, a motif or bold green and

while \'ertical stripes is bomered at the top and bottom by just a hint of a

delicate floral pnUern. The change in ronnal and emotional scale is finely

calibrnted and tremendously satisfying. Irene Williams's "Bars" (ca lOGS)

Art in America I 

Site Jfil/le&lIzer: "/lousefop" nine-block, "fla{fLog I.Mation,

co. /955, roUt"., ' IIII/helle blend. , 8() bll 76 inrhe •.

features a composition of four thick vertical hars in solid cream and black,

topped with a similarly sized horizontal in deep blue-green This archil.ectonic structure is of'fsct by a flower-IJ.1ttemed border on both sides and the

bottom. It however, the narrow top border that gP.'eS the quilt its kick.

The right-hand half of the border is the same blue·green

as the horizontal bar directly below it, while the left-hand

half is divided into three sections-gray and cream, a

small light-blue grid and a slice of vibrant red completely out

of chromatic character witillhe rest of lhe quilt. That foot or

so of crimson makes the quilL It's a formal mO\'(l that incorpcr

rates a sure sense of scale with a usc of olJ-complementaries

worthy of Josef Albers.

Simple, forceful design, unencumbered by is a

hallmark of the Gee's Bend qu ilts. The quilts speak

of a work ethic, not a "make-..... one. Quilting was often a

social activity, particularly during lhe labor-intensive stage

of sewing (he designed front onto the backing and fuLLS sandwiching in the cotton filler. But it was not a hobby, a way of

whiling away Lhe hours. The women quiltel'S were vital parts

of a barely self-sustaining agricultural society, and their

labor was needed in the fields during the day. The field work

tiring, and there were household duties on lOp of thatchores not assisted by the time- and labor-saving devices so

common in the rest of American society. One reason for lhe

quills' relative simplicity is purely Ilractical: the quitters

108 Oclober 200S

Annie Mae }'oung: Strip', 00_ 19'15,

rordufOlI, 95 bll l 05 (nc,,""

Ordinary quilts tend to frame details in

regularly repeating patterns. Gee's Bend

quilts don't do that. They are bounded,

unique and rarely symmetrical.

\\-'allted to fmish them reasona.bly quickly so that they could be used for

their intended purpose-to keep warm_ Gee's Bend \\"3.5 a vel)' poor community that could ill alford luxuries like swre-bought blankets and bed

coverings. Even if, like Loretta Pettway, one or the most talented of the

Gee's Bend quilters, you didn't like to sew, there wasn't much choice in

lhe matter. As she said, WI had a lot of work to do. Feed work in the

fi eld, take care of my handicaPIKld brother. Had to go 1.0 the fi eld. Had to

walk about fifty miles in the field evel)' day. Get home too tired to do no

sewing. My grandmama, Prissy Pen-way, told me, 'You better make quillS.

You goil18 to need them.' I said, 'I ain't going to need no quilts.' but when

I got me a house, a raggiy old house, then I needed them to keepwarm_"·

The Gee's Bend quilts embody a moral as well as a formal eronolllY. In

contrdSl to lhe larger culture of obsolescence, waste and disposability, in

Gee's Bend nothing usable was thrown away (although not evel)'thing

was won1i some polyester leisure suits sent dO\\71 from the north were so

out of style that they could only be recycled into bedding). Scraps of

cloth were saved up ror quilting-any sort. of cotton, corduroy, knit or

synthetic fabric was fine. Clothing was wom until it was worn out, and

then ripped up into quilt material rather than being discarded.

Used clothing is scarcely a neutral art material. Not only does it

embrace a range of social signs, but it can also carry the physical imprint

of the wearer, the trace of his or her hody. We CtUl see the pressure of

elbows and knees, feel the stretch of fabric under the neatly applied

patches_ Denim clothing shows this Lo particular advantage, and some of

lhe most emotionally affecting quilts were made from sun- and washfaded work clothes. Missouri Pettway's daughter, Arlonzia, spoke of her

late mother's quilt, a blue, white, reddish-brown and gray block-and-strip

design made in 1942. Wit was when Daddy died. I was about se\'Cnteen,

eighteen. He stayed sick about eight momhs and passed on. Mama say, 'I 

going to take his work clothes, shallC them into a quilt to remember him,

and OO\'er up under it for love.""

In these .... ,ork-clothes quilts the quietness of the colors--blues, g:rays,

creams, browns-allows fo:r an extremely subtle interplay or hue and

value, and also ro:r the counterpoint of darker passages: se .... 'Hln patches,

the unfaded area unde:r removed pants pockets, o:r seams that had, prior

to ripping, been unexposed. The c\omes, by virtue of their hard use, were

sometimes stained with earth, rust and sweat That discoloration, rather

than diminishing Ole power of the quilts, gh'es them a and emt>-

tional 1)''1lina. This can be clearly seen In R.'1chel Carey George's quilt

from around \035, made of denim, wool trousers, mattress ticking and

colton. III It, a large horizontal rectangle of stained blue-and-white tickHiflUuru: rnri6tJQf'J nJ. 1965, rrool bit, Until,

IIDullk kIIlt, t:OIloII drGptrf ",uttriDl, St Of i9 illo" ....

ing is contrasted with wide strips of oval-patched pants legs and another

large :rectangle of white-stitched gray wool. The staining of the mattress

ticking is echoed by similar brown areas in other parts of the quilt, particularly In the pants The sense of lime's passage, of difficulties

endured and O\-ercome, is palpable.

Something similar can be felt in Lorella Pettwats Gal (Bars),"

ca. 1005. One of the seemingly simplest ..... urks on \1ew, it consists solely

coldim/Cd on page 148

Art jll America t( 

Gee's Bend

continued/rom page 109

of vertical bars. There is a bortler on the left and right of dark navy

(edged with a hint of pattem), a field of quiet blue-violet, and left of cen·

ter, two equal·si1.ed white bands. Measuring a bit under 7 by 6 feet, this

quilt cannot help recalling, for today's viewer, Bamet!, Newman's paint,

ings. As wilh Newman, it carries with it the air of the spiritual. Indeed,

the current of faith runs deep in Gee's Bend, while the quilts are not

part of a specific spiritual practice in their making or their iconography,

it is not unreruiOnable to assume that, the clJe<:ts of such a religiously

innected life are to be seen in the community's art.

Probably the most viscerally powerful .... ork-clOlhes quilt in the show

is Lutisha Petv.va.v's "BarsM (ca. 1050). Composed entirely of faded

and patched denim pants legs, laid out in vertical bands, the heavy quilt

sat$, bends and buckles. Edging it on the right are a pair of pants legs,

wide at the waist and narrow at the ankles. They are sewn together at

the small ends, and their symmetrical mirroring gi\"CS the right edge a

sharp bow inwards, in clear contrast to the retatively straight bottom,

top, and left sides. While other quilts use CUleUp clothing in small enough

pieces so thnt we are Oftell forced 1.0 infer its originlll use, this quilL uses

pants legs in virtually their entirety, and as such, the sense of the body

undemealh the clothing remains parlicularly strong. Color, too, makes a

mf\jor contribution- Its monochrome quality adding purposefulness,

consistent'Y and intensity.

Denim, while hem)' ruld hard to work with, brings with it a coloristic

bonus. lis fading creates a wide variety tlf blues, from dt'C]l indigo to the

I)''llest pinked IiZtlre, a color mngc IUltumlly suggestive of sky and atmosphere, That property is used to mar'l'elous effcct in a 1076 work by Annie

Mac Young, an artist whose originality and conwositionaJ bmvum stand

out in remarkably talented group. The quill floats a centml vertically

striped portion against a field of variously faded denim bars. TIle sl.rijM!<i

area is di\ided in Imlf horir.ont.'llly. The top portion alternates red and

stripes, the botwm red and brown. The two sections don't quite

match uj>-the striJles are of different widths and are drawn (there is no

other word for it) with a loose, expressive line. The center stril>ed secLion

has an emblematic, flaglike qulllity th31 seems both w embed the stripes

in the atmosJlheric blue field and suspend them above it.

One the sense of a fL'Ig or a heraldic banner in YOlUlg'S 1975 cor·

duroy quilL as .... 'ell. This large hori7.ontalty dispia,}' ld piece, a bit under 8 by

o feet, is one of the high points of the exhibition. A series orthin horizontal

stripes-allcrnating red and brown on the wp half, reds, browns, greens,

blues and oranges on the bottom half- marks otrtlle right·h:Uld quarter of

the quill On the left edge is a tlIin column of vcrtical multicolored stripes

divided roughly into thirds horizontally. The remainder, approximately

tv."{)-thirds of the area of the entire quill, is an astonishingly rich ccrule:UI.

Composed of horizontal strips of closely \'alued fabric, this section allows

for a complex visual interplay between its subtlety and Ule boldness of the

stripes flanking it, and also for an interchnnge between the horizontalily

lUld vcrticality of the two striped secLions. Words can hardly do justice to

tile sophisticated and satisfying play ofvisu.'lI elements--the way the same

blue as the center sneaks into the stripes 011 the sides, or how the heft or

the horizontally striped area perfectly balances the narrower or

why lhe Illtematin.g of red lUld brown stripes on the upper portion of the

righl hand section putsjust the right. anlountofweighl alld pressure on the

slightly thinner multicolored stripes below them.

The LL'IC of corduroy by Young and a number of other Gee's Benders is a

study in fortuity. In 1972, Sears, Roebuck and Company contracted with

the local (Iuilting cooperati\·c to produce low·priced corduroy pillow

shams. They sent down bolts of the material, lUld while the shams \\'ete

mechanical Jliecework, the corduroy wa..'! soon incoll)Qntted inlo the

148 October2fJ03

Sally /H"M.t/ Jonf!t: em/n- mmafUolI u/th nlllltipk bomf!nI,

1966, RltlOll, 86 by 77 1nthl!l/.

area's quiltmaking style. Corduroy has real limitations-it works best.

when cut al. right lUlgles; it tends to pull, distort and fmy when cut on the

diagonal. These constraints are offset by the cloth's rich color, sensual

light-reflecting qualities and softness. In practical temls, the materia)

was virtually free, and it was very Wllnll. The fabric posed challenges, but

art often lhrives when Ule \'atiables are reduced.

In any case, boldness of design and reclilinearity are chamcteris·

tics of the Gee's Bend quilts; and for some qu ilters, corduroy called

forth their best efforts. China Pettway's block quilt, (ca. 1!)75), for

example, is Bauhausian in ils Simplicity and elegance.

There are only six color areas, each in a rich but muted earth tone.

Small and large, \'ertical and horizontal, dark and light are blended in

a composition, classical in its form and balance. Arcola Pettway's

Gal (Bars)" variation from 1976, the year of the Bicentennial,

has the rough composition of an American nag, with 13 more or less

equal horizontal stripes and a small square area in the UPllcr left

where the stars go----excepl in this case the Qstars" are three addi·

tional vertical stripes, and the colors, inslead of red, white and blue,

are apple green, tan, corn yellow, rusty brown, slate blue, crimson

and orange· red. Color and form work togelher to artfully undermine

expectat.ions, and the quilt is bolh delightful and moving.

The Gee's Bend quilts are so evocatk-e, so emotionally and esthelical·

Iy fulfilling, as .... 'ell as so individulll, ,h:lt it feels unfair not 10 men·

tion more artists and describe more quilts. Fortunately, many more pe0-

ple around the country will now get the chance to see them. The

exhibition was to have sWPI>ed with the Whitney, but it has generated

such a grounds ..... ell of inlerest thlll eight other museums hm'e signed on

to take the show, and it wiU travel for three year.!. This seems like the

perfect, moment fo r this exhibition, even though Gee's Bend has been 

known to the wider art world (or decades. Int.erest In the quilts over the

years has been sporadic--there was a spike in New York in the late '60s,

and in 1967 an appreciative Lee Krasner visited Gee's Bend with her

dealer and bought a number of them. This was the time,lOO, when artists

were entranced by Navajo blankets. These enthusiasms faded, quite p0ssibly because quilts and blankets, although resembling the art being

made then, shared few of its stated premises.

Now, however, the Gee's Bend quilts have a deeper a mnectlon to CUfrent concerns. They speak to the widening base of art production, as well

as to an int.erest in ethnicity and identity. This interest seems to thri\'e in

the exploration of the territory which lies between cultural sign and indio

viduality, that is, between the more easily chartable products of a bounded group Identity and the open-ended activities of the indMduaJ. The

quilts are \'ery much of a time, place, gender and ethnic grouPi but they

are also intensely personal and lm'entn'e. Patterns are often not used at

all, or when they are, they are freely adapted to the artist's own interests

and history.

There is also an interest, these days, in the use of nontraditional materials in abstraction. This often leads LO an Investigation of the Inherent

three-dimensionality of "Oath work. A Gee's Bend quilt is not, as is a

stretched rectangular canvas, a historically given depictn'e arena that

also happens to be made of cloth and whose materiaJily might be tacitly

acknowledged by, for example, staining the canvas. A quilt is both an

image and a constructed, pliable physical object The shape of the

quilt-the irregularity of its edge and the waviness of its surface-is a natural product of its makin& and its use creates an

inherent ambiguity of orientation. Its two-dimensionality is also

conditional since it canjust as easily be nat or draped.

Another artistic concern today is layering. Multiplicity of purpose

and rorm is a given in these quilts. Not only are they, at heart,

assemblages (with all the complexity of facture and reference that

implies), but the rhythmic, patterned stilChing or the g:ridded yam

ties that hold the front to the back are aspects of the quill that function semi-independently. Frequently done by more than one person,

the stitching sets up a quiet but complex counterpoint to the larger

design. Finally, the growing interest in craftlike methodologies

among artist.s also speaks to the lessened aulhority of the brush. No

longer valorized as an extension of the artist's persona, a guarantor

of painterly, gest.ural (and often male) authenticity, it has become

another tool, an option in a wide menu of artmaking procedures.

Piecing and stilChing has pf'(l\'en to be as sensitive, energetic and

direct a means of expression as the most adept brushwork.

Painting in general, and abstract painting in partic:uJar, seems to

have kl;t its centrality. That does not mean that the two-dimensionaI abstract object has surrendered ilS power or allure. Imbued with

art-historical reference, inherently metaphorical and capable of

great it sti1l exerts a strong pull on our imaginations. U great

art can be found in this arena today, the question becomes, why

shouldn't it be in the fonn of a quilt and, more specifically, why not

these quilts? I round myself unexpectedly mO't-OO and excited by this

exhibition, and that feeling has been shared by many others. "The

Quilts of Gee's Bend" has turned out., rather surprisingly, to be one

of the most talked·about shows in recent years.. I expect and hope

that its influence will be deep and long-lasting. 0

l. In terms of Influences, It has boon noted lhal th;!re are certaln simiiarities

between the Bend quilts and West alld Centnll Mrkan textiles, bul given the

lack or IIIsWrica1 this COfU'II.'dJon tan only be

2. A double CD 01", music rtcOnIed h1 Gee's Hend h1 I!HI arwI2002,HottJ Hi

GoI tMr: 17M 50crfd &nI!P Gftiol lkrtd, is available in oonJuncUon with the

allow. A number of the quilten In the exhibition &ing on these CDs.

3. It should be IIOI.6d that IndlcaUoos oh 'ertlcal or horbontal refer W the orienl.l·

lion or the quillS as dl5played. Since they were IS bed nol

Iwlglnp, d!stlnctIons between left. and ri&hl arwI up and btl are aomewIW. ubi·

""Y.

If great abstract art can be found today,

the question becomes, why shouldn't

it be in the form of a quilt and, more

specifically, why not these quilts?

4. f'rom the 6IUbltlon cataIop, 7lt ikrtd, Allan" and Houston, 1lIMlOd

Boob: in .saoclation the MU5eUm of nne Alta. Houson, 2002, p. 72.

0. ibid., p. 67.

Quilts O/(M', &N/- 1tW Of1NJ"ind/or 1M 0/ HOII.IlotI., b¥

MUM'" AmtU, .loll" &onWey, JaN Ur:i!lf$l(Jlt alfd AltoWl UoilnUolI\ IL'iIA a.sN4I!fQIllI

1M 1Hu1"'l1 MIIMIIIN AII\triQJII Art frcnn DtOro SirIfP. E:rItibitioM dDJ# M!Ut!Um r.I

FiN..tru, JIoustJJrt fStpl. 8Noo 10, t«JtJ; MIIl/eWIN rI 1411, NaD tOrt

INoon, m-MQT. IIJ03J; Mobik ,41_", "Art /.Inf I+-Alig. 31/; A,.,

MUMII'IIt fSept.17../Q1t. of, ItXJtJ; ComwaJt GoJkrJJ r.I 1411, Itlullillg(oll. D.C /ftO. J+-Mo,

17, I1mJ; CIMItmd rt A'" /.hIM It&pt. I., I1mJ,. OtfJlSkr MIlMtlIIt rt Arl,

Notjoa IOct IS, MQt.JaIL !OO5J; Mmp/li6 BrooItJ MUIftI'IIt A,., /ffA. a.

NXJ5/,. MIIIftI'" rt f'iM ArtI, Bo4Unt /JwIlNtll¥, to05J,. HigA MIIIftIM 0{ Art, AUtrJtta

1\ro 6mt publiWd IJg Ti"ll'OOd Alhmla, o'lld 1M MIIItIIIII tiM

An.s, 11ou.U0II, {" wilJIlM QIIibitio..: The QuillS of Gee', Bend and Gee's

Bend: The Women and Their QuU\$

LomllJ hlt.Gf: StlUttpI«:«J fUIU. "60, cotl(uf t¥Ul,.".1IIdk IfUJkrW

dotAlq), It .. 11 lMJtn..

Art in Amm'ca 149 

ARTE POVERA

Synopsis

Arte Povera - "poor art" or "impoverished art" - was the most significant and influential avantgarde movement to emerge in Europe in the 1960s. It grouped the work of around a dozen Italian

artists whose most distinctly recognizable trait was their use of commonplace materials that might

evoke a pre-industrial age, such as earth, rocks, clothing, paper and rope. Their work marked a

reaction against the modernist abstract painting that had dominated European art in the 1950s, hence

much of the group's work is sculptural. But the group also rejected American Minimalism, in

particular what they perceived as its enthusiasm for technology. In this respect Arte Povera

echoes Post-Minimalist tendencies in American art of the 1960s. But in its opposition

to modernism and technology, and its evocations of the past, locality and memory, the movement is

distinctly Italian.

Key Ideas

Although Arte Povera is most notable for its use of simple, artisanal materials, it did not use

these to the exclusion of all else. Some of the group's most memorable work comes from the contrast

of unprocessed materials with references to the most recent consumer culture. Believing that

modernity threatened to erase our sense of memory along with all signs of the past, the Arte Povera

group sought to contrast the new and the old in order to complicate our sense of the effects of passing

time.

In addition to opposing the technological design of American Minimalism, artists associated

with Arte Povera also rejected what they perceived as its scientific rationalism. By contrast, they

conjured a world of myth whose mysteries couldn't be easily explained. Or they presented absurd,

jarring and comical juxtapositions, often of the new and the old, or the highly processed and the preindustrial. By doing so, the Italian artists evoked some of the effects of modernization, how it tended

to destroy experiences of locality and memory as it pushed ever forwards into the future.

Arte Povera's interest in "poor" materials can be seen as related to Assemblage, an international

trend of the 1950s and 1960s that used similar materials. Both movements marked a reaction against

much of the abstract painting that dominated art in the period. They viewed it as too narrowly

concerned with emotion and individual expression, and too confined by the traditions of painting.

Instead, they proposed an art that was much more interested in materiality and physicality, and

borrowed forms and materials from everyday life. Arte Povera might be distinguished from

Assemblage by its interest in modes such as performance and installation, approaches that had more

in common with pre-war avant-gardes such as Surrealism, Dada and Constructivism.

Beginnings

Arte Povera emerged out of the decline of abstract painting in Italy, and the rise of interest in

older avant-garde approaches to making art. In particular, its spirit can be traced to three

artists: Alberto Burri, whose painting made from burlap sacks, provided an example of the use of

poor materials; Piero Manzoni, whose work prefigured qualities of Conceptual art, and which reacted

against abstract, Art Informel painting; and Lucio Fontana, whose monochrome painting provided an

example of the power of art that is reduced to only a few elements and concentrated in its impact.

The term Arte Povera was first used by art critic Germano Celant in 1967 to describe the work

of a group of Italian artists. In the same year he organized the first survey of the trend, "Arte Povera e

IM Spazio," which was staged at Galleria La Bertesca in Genoa, and which included the work

of Alighiero Boetti, Luciano Fabro, Jannis Kounellis, Giulio Paolini, Pino Pascali and Emilio Prini.

All of the work made use of everyday or "poor" materials. For example, Boetti's Pile (1966-67)

consisted of a stack of asbestos blocks; Fabro raised an everyday task to the level of art in Floor

Tautology (1967), in which a tiled floor was kept polished and covered with newspapers to maintain

its cleanliness; and in his Cubic Meters of Earth (1967), Pascali formed mounds of soil into solid

shapes, using a natural but "dirty" material and forcing it into clean, unnatural lines in a critique of

Minimalism. Overall, the organizer of the show chose to focus on the intrusion of the banal into the

realm of art, forcing us to look at previously inconsequential things in a new light.

Only two months after the inaugural show, Celant wrote Arte Povera: Notes for a Guerilla War,

a manifesto that added several more artists to his initial roster: Giovanni Anselmo, Piero

Gilardi, Mario Merz, Gianni Piacentino, Michelangelo Pistoletto, and Gilberto Zorio. With this

declaration, Celant firmly associated himself and the Italians with a new movement in art, but also

put forth a definition of Arte Povera that was more ambiguous than his previous iteration. This was

most obvious with the inclusion of Pistoletto, since his mirror works incorporated elements of

photography, a medium notably avoided by other members of the group. Notes for a Guerilla

War linked the artists conceptually (rather than on any formal or stylistic basis) through what Celant

saw as their common desire to destroy "the dichotomy between art and life."

Concepts and Styles

Arte Povera is most notable for its use of everyday materials, materials which contrasted with

the apparently industrial sensibility of American Minimalism. At the same time the movement

employed subversive avant-garde tactics, such as performance, and unconventional approaches to

sculpture, such as installation. In their mission to reconnect life with art, the Italian Arte Povera artists

strove to evoke an individual, personal response in each of their pieces, stressing an interaction

between viewer and object that was unrepeatable and purely original.

Crucial in the formation and success of Arte Povera was Germano Celant, and in this respect

Arte Povera is typical of avant-garde groups that have been given momentum and cohesion by a

single voice. Out of what is often a vague similarity of ideas and approaches, an apparent coherence

is presented, and so the interests of a particular group of artists can be more effectively promoted.

Hence, Celant's interpretations of the artists associated with Arte Povera have remained prominent

and important, and Celant often stressed the Italians'interest in individual subjectivity. For example,

Michelangelo Pistoletto is known above all for works in which photographic images of figures are

displayed on mirrors; Celant once described a different but related work, the simple metal

construction Structure for Standing While Talking (1965-66), as a medium to create a personal dialog

between art and viewer, free from any preconceived notions. Giovani Anselmo's early work also

relied on human interaction to fully experience the art, which was loosely constructed in order to

react to the slightest touch. Pino Pascali and Jannis Kounellis he described as experiencing life

through sensuality, engaging the senses to create a feeling of wonder, as in Pascali's colorful and

spiky Bristleworms, or the installation of live animals in Kounellis' Untitled (Twelve Horses). Celant's

most dramatic pronouncement was saved for the igloos of Mario Merz, and perhaps reflected his

hopes for the implications of Arte Povera: "He performs a constant sacrifice of the banal, everyday

object, as though it were a newfound Christ. Having found his nail, Merz becomes the system's

philistine and crucifies the world."

Later Developments

Celant succeeded in carving out a place for Arte Povera within the avant-garde. By illustrating

a relationship to Futurism and Italian classicism, as well as to more contemporary styles such as Land

art, he lent the movement a place in what could be seen as a living tradition. His

exhibition Conceptual Art, Arte Povera, Land Art, held at the Galleria Civica dell'Arte in 1970,

showcased this contextualization. By this time, though, the artists had an international presence and

were trying to break free of the name that had associated them with poor materials. For example, they

opposed the use of the name "Arte Povera" in the title of an important group show at the

Kunstmuseum in Lucerne; to replace it, curator Jean-Christophe Ammann proposed "Visualized Art

Processes."

Despite growing popularity, the movement dissolved in the mid 1970s as the individual styles

of the Italian artists continued to grow in different directions. Their brief unity, however, had already

made its mark on the history of art, although its importance was not fully recognized until decades

later. Following a reassessment of the 1960s, with critics now paying greater attention to movements

outside the United States in the period, Arte Povera has experienced a revival, and has been cited as a

precursor for some recent approaches to sculpture. Significant reassessments have included "Gravity

and Grace: Arte Povera / Post-Minimalism," at the Hayward Gallery, London, in 1993, and "Zero to

Infinity: Arte Povera 1962-1972" at the Tate Gallery, London, in 2002.

QUOTES

"The difficulty of knowledge, or of taking possession of things, is enormous: conditioning prevents us

from seeing a pavement, a corner, or a daily space, and Fabro re-proposes the rediscovery of a

pavement, a corner, or the axis that unites the floor and ceiling of a room. He's not worried about

satisfying the system, and intends instead to disembowel it."

- Germano Celant in Arte Povera: Notes on a Guerilla War

"What is happening? Banality is entering the arena of art. The insignificant is coming into being or,

rather, it is beginning to impose itself. Physical presence and behavior have themselves become art...

We are living in a period of deculturation. Iconographic conventions are collapsing, symbolic and

conventional languages crumbling."

- Germano Celant, from the exhibition catalogue for Arte Povera e IM Spazio

an ordeal of measurement tenuously alludes to a monumentally stretched-out

version of Truth or Consequences. I ... ]

In choosing representational strategies I aim for the distancing ( ostranenie

the Verfremdungseffekt), the distantiation occasioned by a refusal of realism, b '

foi led expectations, by palpably flouted conventions. Tactically I tend to use~

wretched pacing and a bent space; the immovable shot or, conversely, the

unexpected edit, pointing to the mediating agencies of photography and speech;

long shots rather than close ups, to deny psychological intent; contradictory

utterances; and, in acting, flattened affect, histrionics or staginess. Although

video is simply one medium among several that are effective in confronting real

issues of culture. video based on TV has this special virtue; it has little difficulty

in lending itself to the kind of 'crude thinking', as Brecht used this phrase, that

seems necessary to penetrate the waking daydreams that hold us in thrall. The

clarification of vision is a first step towards reasonably and humanely changing

the world.

!The TV cookery programme presenter.I

Martha Rosier, extracts from 'to argue for a video of representation. to argue for a video against the

mythology of everyday life', pamphlet for 'New American Film Makers: Martha Rosier' (New York:

Whitney Museum of American Art, 1977); reprinted in Rosier, Decoys and Disruptions: Selected

Writings. 1975-2001 (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2004) 366- 9.

Allen Ruppersberg

Fifty Helpful Hints on the Art of the Everyday//1985

General

The individual search for the secret of life and death. That is the inspiration and

the key.

The reality of impressions and the impression of reality.

The ordinary event leads to the beauty and understanding of the world.

Start out and go in.

Each work is singular, unique and resists any stylistic or linear analysis. Each

work is one of a kind.

Personal, eccentric, peculiar, quirky, idiosyncratic, queer.

The presentation of a real thing.

54/ / ART AND THE EVERYDAY 

Allen Ruppersberg, Fifty Helpful Hints on the Art of the Everyday, 1985 

The ordinary and the rare, their interconnectedness and interchangeability.

There is a quotidian sense of loss and tragedy.

Collect accumulate, gather, preserve, examine, catalogue read look

· . · · , study research change, organize, file, cross-reference, number, assemble cat . · ' · egonze classify, and conserve the ephemeral. ·

Art should make use of common methods and materials so there is little

difference between the talk and the talked about. [ ... ]

A sort of journalist reporting on the common, observable world.

Suicide is often the subject because it is a representative example of the ultimate

moment of mystery. The last private thought.

Look for narrative of any kind. Anti-narrative, non-narrative, para-narrative

' semi-narrative, quasi-narrative, post-narrative, bad narrative.

Use everything.

The artist is a mysterious entertainer.

Specific

[ ... ] l want to reveal the quality of a moment in passing. Where something is

recognized and acknowledged but remains mysterious and undefined. You

continue on your way, but have been subtly changed from that point on.

I try to set up a network of ideas and emotions with only the tip showing. The

major portion of the piece continues to whirl and ferment underneath, just as

things do in the world at large.

It is constructed to work on you after you have seen it.

The act of copying something allows the use of things as they are, without

altering their original nature. They can then be used with ideas about art on a

fifty-fifty basis, and create something entirely new.

It operates on a basis of missing parts. The formal structure, a minimalist

strategy of viewer completion and involvement, is one of fragment, space,

fragment, space, fragment, fragment, space, space, space.

The form of each piece is determined by the nature of its subject.[ ... ]

I'm interested in the translation of life to art because it seems to me that the

world is fine just as it is. [ ... ]

Allen Ruppersberg, extracts from 'Fifty He lpful Hints on the Art of the Everyday,' The Secret of Life

and Death (Los Angeles: The Museum of Contemporary Art/Santa Barbara: Black Sparrow Press.

1985) 111 - 14.

56// ART AND THE EVERYDAY 

trategies to it. The result is formalism intensified to the qualitative crisis point.

~he work makes its intervention in the context of a formalized emptiness of

existing genres. but does not create an antithetical emptiness, a purely abstract or

emblematic intervention. In fusing the journalistic attitude which accepts the

primacy of subject-matter together with the Situationist-conceptualist strategy of

interventionism and detournement, the work establishes a discourse in which its

subject-matter, a critique of Minimalism and Pop via a discussion of the

architectural disaster upon which they both depend, can be enlarged to the point

of a historical critique of reigning American cultural development.

This approach became identified explicitly with architectural theory and

discourse by 1973-74 via a series of video-performance works. These and the

environmental 'functional behavioural models' use window, mirror and video

control systems to construct dramas of spectatorship and surveillance in the

abstracted containers of gallery architecture. Following his ideas about the

relation of the work of art to the implicit semiotics of its built environment, its

institutionally-designed container, the emphasis shifts through the decade of the

seventies from an experimental concentration on enactment or behaviour

('performance'), to work upon the actual institutional settings of these 'dramas'.

Graham's work shows new influences, particularly from Daniel Buren, Michael

Asher and Gordon Matta-Clark, with the effect that architecture emerges as the

determining or decisive art form, because it most wholly reflects institutional

structure, and influences behaviour through its definition of positionality. [ ... ]

Jeff Wall, extract from 'Dan Graham's Kammerspiel', in Real Life Magazine, no. 15 (Winter 1985/86):

reprinted in Jeff Wall, Selected Essays and lnteIViews (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2007)

23-33.

Jonathan Watkins

Every Day//1998

There is a growing interest amongst contemporary artists, worldwide, in

quotidian phenomena and the power of relatively simple gestures. It constitutes a

rejoinder to played-out operatic tendencies and an overloaded academic ( often

pseudo-academic) discourse in visual arts, engendered by early postmodernism.

The imminence of the year 2000 makes this artistic sea change at once

paradoxical and timely, a foil for the portentousness of millennial cultural events.

Watkins//Every Day//61 

E P

hasis here is placed on the significance of every day, and any day

m . f , not on th distance between now and arbitrary past and uture dates in Western h' e . . f h' h'b' . . IStory The fundamental propos1t1on o t 1s ex 1 1t1on arises out of curr : . ent an1stic

ractice. Selected works are characterized by efficacy and unpreciousne

p . 'd II i- ss. They e unforced artistic statements, mc1 enta y pro1ound observation

ar . . . . . s on the

ture of our Jives as lived every day, m contrad1stmct1on to supposed! r,

na . . . . . Y m-de1

.ecle appropriatiomst, neo-surreahst or mannerist strategies _ all-too-' .. s . . 1arn1har

·n living memory - and likewise new-age transcendentalist gestur . I . • • . . . es. Their

impetus, derived f1~om what 1_s ord1~ary, 1s not unlike tha_t which led nineteenthcentury French artists to their realist and subsequently impressionist positi

It is more human than spiritual, more empiricist than idealistic ons. . . , more

philosophical than 1deological.

Though this project springs from a current Western context the . . . , re 1s

significant correspondence with a wide range of cultural traditions increasin 1

h h . . 1· gy being acknowledged t roug a new 111ternat1ona ism. As every day occurs

everywhere in the world, participating artists hail from each of the five

continents. The curatorial challenge arises from the relativism of what is

everyday, the differences between what is familiar, common or ordinary within

the diversity of cultures represented. The aim is to communicate the nature of

every day and to be culturally specific, declaring differences without resorting to

exoticism, particularly in the presentation of non-Western art. Whereas a

sublime and prescriptive world-view of contemporary art is out of the question,

a more balanced and ultimately more constructive global dialogue is certainly

feasible. The Biennale presents an opportunity for the telling juxtaposition of

work by artists whose distance from one another is normally vast. Here, for

example, On Kawara Uapan/USA) meets Georges Adeagbo (Benin), Frederic Bruly

Bouabre (Ivory Coast) and Jean Frederic Schnyder (Switzerland) in works that all

resemble personal journals. The single-image colour photographs by Roy Arden

(Canada), Noa Zait (Israel) and Pekka Turunen (Finland), so evocative

particularly of the places they depict, can be readily compared. The minimalism

of paintings by Katherina Grosse (Germany), Rover Thomas (Australia) and Ding

Yi (China) seen in proximity suggest an affinity in spite of the virtually

incommensurable thought systems which inform them.

The broad area covered by this exhibition is articulated by various concerns

and stances. Pronouncements with respect to style or medium (the dominance

of one, the redundancy of another) are deliberately avoided, deemed pointless

now, but the artists clearly do share various attitudes. Above all perhaps is an

aspiration to directness, as opposed to gratuitous mediation or obscurantism. A

break is made with art about art (interrogation of its own artistic identity) and

continuity is affirmed between phenomena within and beyond the art world.

62//IJff AND TID EVERYDAY 

Much of the work exhibited ~mbodies or marks the passage of time through

traces of the process of production, thereby stressing its place in our material

world. Time is _measured out !n gestures analogous to the coming and going of

every day, reminders that all 1s temporary and mutable. Concomitant with this

is the acknowledgement that the everyday is manifest as much in natural

phenomena as it is in co~mOI~ man-ma~e or urban subjects.

Carl Andre's work ep1tom1ses the d1rectness at the heart of this project,

diametrically opposed to theatricality. Its concrete nature, its 'this-is-this-ness',

at once conveys the artist's feeling for basic materials and a tough logic which

does not distract from the fact that they are simply there. Denise Kum and

Ernesto Neto similarly encourage an apprehension of material fact. The latter,

who is working in a Brazilian tradition notably developed by Helio Oiticica and

Lygia Clark. seems to encourage a revelry in stuff - ranging from lead shot to

powdered spices - and recently his exhibitions have included Iycra tent-like

structures which can be entered and experienced from the inside. Kum takes

raw chemical substances and combines them with extraordinary results, an

abstract insistence on the possibility of invention. [ ... )

The unhindered flow of information from everyday life into the art world

was made conscious and deliberate with Marcel Duchamp's introduction of the

Readymade, and not surprisingly, readymade objects are found throughout this

exhibition. Jose Resende is a choreographer of cranes and shipping containers,

Virginia Ward resurrects discarded machinery, Desmond Kum Chi-Keung works

with bamboo bird cages, while Marijke van Warmerdam invites us to gamble on

one-armed bandits.

It is a truism that art can be made from anything. Rasheed Araeen's recent

works are made from scaffolding, Tadashi Kawamata's from garden sheds. Peter

Robinson (3.125% Maori) treads a tightrope stretched between political

correctness and heresy as he picks up awful nationalist cliches and racist taunts,

as readymades, and then throws them back.

Vladimir Arkhipov's Post-Folk Archive puts a further twist to the tale of the

Readymade, consisting as it does of home-made gadgets, all ready made,

collected from people living around Moscow. The ingenuity of these gadgets, in

the face of shortages of the most ordinary manufactured goods, inspired him to

stop being a sculptor and start collecting. Now Arkhipov's art practice bridges

the gap between the useful lives of these gadgets and their acquired identity as

components of an artwork. The twist lies in the fact that these are not

manufactured objects, as readymades usually are, but instead unique creations

which might be mistaken for folk art, implying a curatorial effort to somehow

'elevate' them. This could not be further from the truth, Arkhipov suggests,

because the art world clearly does not occupy elevated ground.

Watkins/ / Every Day//63 

kok has an ,ut1 st1 c community, la rgely orbiting around the About Cai Bang . d' . . e.

h I _ 111 extraordinJry emphasis on au 1ence part1c1patiun, asserting \\'hie p ates~ not

d O ran, of objects through the use of readymades but also only a em .. , . . . · an

d den ·e between artists .rnd non-artists. In the sptnt of Jorge L . inter epen t u1s

ho argued for the recognition of the crucial role of the reader m Borge , w . . . . , any

Thai arti t are literally making work with their audience. R1rkrit Tiravanija has

at different times provided take-away fo?d· a recording studio for passers-by

,rnd art work hops for children. Suras1 Kusolwong recently organized an

exchange of everyday objects with gallery visitors. Chumpon Apisuk, in a longteni, project concerned with the plight of local sex-workers, especially with

re pect to HIV and AIDS, exhibits a continuing correspondence by fax and

recorded messages.

Navin Rawanchaikul's work for this exhibition developed out of his Navin

Gallery, Bangkok, an ordinary working taxi in Bangkok which is also the venue

for an exhibition programme. It is based on recorded conversations with Sydney

taxi drivers. These are transformed into a small comic story book, Another Day

in Sydney, freely available in taxis around town, and a sound installation

involving a taxi parked inside the exhibition.

Guy Bar-Amotz, an Israeli artist now based in London and Amsterdam, also

derives his work from an identifiable professional group, buskers, and karaoke is

the chosen form of audience participation. The gruesome cathartic sing-a-long

of the overworked middle classes with underprivileged accompaniment, an

increasing phenomenon around the world, is a characteristically edgy mix.

Perhaps as an antidote, the home has come to signify, more than ever, a

refuge, as Nikos Papastergiadis observes in his essay here: 'Not only are more

and more people living in places which are remote and unfamiliar to them, but

even those who have not moved increasingly feel estranged from their own

sense of place.' Whether or not this is directly experienced by artists, a

preponderance of current art works refer to the nature of the home, often

problematically, and reflect a basic need for shelter.

Desmond Kum Chi-Keung's birdcages allude to the overcrowded housing

conditions in Hong Kong. Gavin Hipkins' photostrips make up an obsessive

unedited analysis of the various rooms he inhabits. Howard Arkley's choice of

the suburban Australian home as a subject for his spray paintings could not be

more apt. Maria Hedlund's white photographs suggest the corruptible nature of

the domestic spaces we create for ourselves.

Absalon's actual-size white prototypes for houses epitomise a very particular

daily life and at the same time anticipate his tragic early death. Ostensibly. the

Cellules, to be built in various cities around the world, were to be small buildings

in which the artist lived alone. with room enough for only one visitor at a time.

64// ART AND THE EVERYDAY 

Shimabuku, The Story of the Travelling Cafe, 19% 

With interconnected spaces for eating, sleeping, working and toilet a 1 . . . . C IVJty, the

designs betray the formative 111tluences not only of classic modernism b . ut also the

artist's native m idd le-eastern culture. Ideas from Arab architecture a d Be . . d . n douin life are combined for the accommo at1on of an endlessly travelling ind· .d . . . 1v1 ual.

The appeal of the Cellules hes largely m the viewer's identificat· . IOn With

Absalon's need to make a place for himself. Henrietta Lehtonen's work N

· f I b ·1 h eSf, (1995), subtitled 'Reconstruction o . a nest. ut. t w en five years old. At the age

of eighteen I started to study architecture, strikes the same chord Sof.as

· . rugs

blanket, pillows and a coffee table are rearranged in order to create a child-sized

refuge, one to keep the adult world at bay.

Other works by Lehtonen have referred directly to childhood and in this too,

she is not alone amongst contemporary artists. There is a distinct revival of

interest in the world of children. This is not sentimental and more than a simple

acknowledgement that children are equaIJy part of everyday life - it springs

from an appreciation that children's perception is relatively unhabituated and

their expression of thoughts and feelings is refreshingly candid. Furthermore,

children are indicative of an imagined future and thus their significant figuring

as subjects in contemporary art tends to contradict notions of a washed-up,

decadent culture. [ ... ]

On Kawara's work is canonical, direct and economical, marking time as it

passes - in the case of his Date Paintings, against an unseen backdrop of

newspaper pages which reiterate his continuing existence. His famous

statement 'I am still alive' (at once too much and not enough, wonderfully funny

and deadly serious) is implicit in everything he does. Parts of his / Met and I

Went projects (from 1968), recording everywhere he went and everyone he met

on the same days thirty years ago, are also in this exhibition.

The measured continuum of time embodied in On Kawara's work features in

many works in this exhibition. Frederic Bruly Bouabre's postcard-sized pictures

are drawn from daily life in his village of Zepregtihe on the Ivory Coast. Hung in

long rows they suggest both a spelt-out pictorial language and, as each is dated,

the regular diurnal cycle. The dates assert the fact that he was actually there, then.

Jean Frederic Schnyder exhibits a row of forty paintings, each depicting a

sunset over the Zugersee, the lake near his home. Riding his bicycle to the same

place every evening during several months last year, he set about painting the

same scene en plein air, one painting per day, thereby recording the incremental

movement of the sun in relation to the horizon and a spectrum of impressions

and meteorological effects. Intersecting in Schnyder's work are a number of

concerns which exemplify the thesis of this exhibition. They include a response,

as direct as possible, to his subject, a subject that is at once familiar and taken as

it is, and a concern with the effects of temporality.

66// ART AND THE :EVERYDAY 

In addition, Schnyder is declaring his unabashed interest in landscape and

natural phenomena. Many other artists here, such as Roni Horn. Patrick Killoran,

Olafur Eliasson, Gereon Lepper, Kim You ng-Jin, Dieter Kiessling. Joyce Campbell.

Jimmy Wululu and Rover Thomas, are doing the same. This does not signify a

sentimenta l or reactionary tendency, somehow in opposition to an avant-garde:

it is rather the artistic expression of what happens every day, as innovative as it

is uncontrived.

The serial nature of Schnyder's work. and that of On Kawara and Bouabre,

suggests another pattern which can be extended to include those artists in this

exhibition whose practice involves small repetitive gestures, a certain

orientation towards craft activity. There is reference to the marking of time, and

a light touch on the subject of mortality, for example, in the work of Fernanda

Gomes and Germaine Koh. The latter's ongoing project, Knitwork. is an

accumulation of her knitting with wool unravelled from second-hand garments.

Its present sixty-metre length has Sisyphean implications and becomes

increasingly a heavier burden. Ani O'Neill's crocheted circles have affinities with

the project of Katherina Grosse and, at the same time, bear witness to her

ancestry in the Cook Islands.

The woven works of Aboriginal artists Margaret Robyn Djunjiny and

Elizabeth Djutarra also derive from traditional culture. Ding Yi uses paintstick on

tartan fabric, playing off the pattern or mimicking the weave with a technique

which clearly betrays the influence of Buddhist philosophy, through calligraphy.

Kim Soo-Ja conflates fabric bundles, potent symbols of the role of women in

Korean society, with video images of their movement.

The reference to craft is taken to an extreme by those artists who simulate

the everyday, not in games of double-take or due to a latter day PreRaphaelitism, but because the subject suggests itself as absolutely sufficient. The

meticulousness of the process signifies a fascination with the smallest detail.

and simulation is the logical conclusion. Fischli and Weiss produce painted

polyurethane sculptures of the most humble objects, such as orange peel and

cigarette ends, and Yoshihiro Suda makes painted wooden flowers and weeds.

Clay Ketter and Joe Scanlan use the actual materials of their chosen subjects -

respectively, plasterboard, nails and plaster for sculptures of sections of

prepared walls, and timber for a coffin sculpture - and their aspiration to

directness could not be clearer.

Ketter and Scanlan operate within the realm of the everyday, and every day,

as do Fischli and Weiss, Carl Andre, Lisa Milroy, On Kawara, Virginia Ward, Joyce

Campbell, Georges Adeagbo, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and the many other artists

included in this exhibition.

Such diversity with respect to media, style and subject matter, such interest

Watkins//Every Day//67 

. all areas of ltfe and unp1etent1ousness, however, does not mean th . tn . . 1s 1s an an

world where anything goes. Never does anything go. Then again. nev b

· er efore has an art world been so open, and so accessible.

J athan Watkins, lnrroductton, Every Day. 11th 81ennale of Sydney (Sydney: Birnnal f

on e o Sydney,

1998) 15- 19.

Nikos Papastergiadis

'Everything That Surrounds': Art, Politics and Theories

of the Everyday//1998

[ ... ] Bringing art and life as close together as possible can be a healthy antidote

to some of the academicist approaches emerging in the late 1980s. However, it

can also lead to the idiocies and banalities of life being reproduced under the

name of art. The relationship between art and life is never straightforward or

transparent. What cannot be denied, however, is the need for the artist to start

from the materiality of both art practice and experience. This appreciation of

materiality does not preclude language, nor does it imply that the limitations of

our specific starting points, by their mere display, should be elevated to

marvellous achievements. [ ... ]

In the new art there is both sensuous absorption with the present, a

shameless fascination with the abject, and a candid representation of the

banalities of everyday life. Neither the pleasures nor the vices expressive of this

voluptuous self-presence are embedded within a social history of political

solidarity or aesthetic investigation. This practice of acknowledgement is

disavowed as being part of the boring politics of correctness. Yet paradoxically,

in the assertion of newness there is both rejection of lineage and claim of

assimilation. It is assumed that the new British art has already embraced the

kernel of the old without hanging onto the academicist crust of history. This

dynamic of internalization is supposedly already there in the pulse of popular

culture. Can we assume that the history of resistance is already incorporated in

popular consciousness, and that, by virtue of its own sensual and material

practice, the production of art traces the contours of this silent knowledge and

bears witness to all that is knowable and real? To attempt to forget the past is to

be condemned to repeat it by other means. [ ... ]

Despite repeated efforts to break the divide between popular culture and

high art, the concept of the everyday has remained relatively untheorized within

68// ART AND THE EVERYDAY 

d 1 Ctt dialogue with the predominant movements of critical art of their . conscious an exp 1 . . • • J>enOd.

W rd ·Toe Hc1unced Museum: lnstttullonal Cnttque and Publicity' Onobf!

20 1361 Frazer J • ' r, 73

(Summer 1995) 83. . . . , .

C ,

11,.d this in the descnpttve list of Rosier s works found 111 Mdrthd R 1 21 1381 The tape 1s u '" os er:

. the Life world ed. Catherine de Zegher (Birmingham. England· lk Po wons m · · on

Gallery/Vienna: Generali Foundation. 1998).

I . Martha Rosier Positions in the Life World, 31. 22 1401 Ros er in ·

23 1441 Fredric Jameson, 'Periodizing the 1960s', in The Sixties without Apology (Minneapolis:

. ·ry of Mi·nnesota Press 1984) 79. Additionally, Martha Rosier has said of her own w k un1vers1 · or :

'Everything 1 have ever done I've thought of "as if': Every single thing I have offered to the public

has been offered as a suggestion of a work ... which is that my work is a sketch, a line of thinking,

a possibility.' ('a conversation with Martha Rosier', in Martha Rosier: Positions in the Ufe World, 31 ).

24 1451 For more on the importance of privacy, see Drucilla Cornell, At the Heart of Freedom:

Feminism, Sex and Equality (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998). I ... ]

25 147I Drucilla Cornell, At the Heart of Freedom, op. cit., 24.

Helen Molesworth, extracts from 'House Work and Art Work', October, no. 92 (Winter 2000) 75_88;

90-6.

Joseph Kosuth

The Artist as Anthropologist//1975

Part II. Theory as Praxis: A Role for an 'Anthropologized Art'

'The highest wisdom would be to understand that every fact is already a theory.'

- Goethe

1. The artist perpetuates his culture by maintaining certain features of it by

'using' them. The artist is a model of the anthropologist engaged. It is the

implosion Mel Ramsden speaks of, an implosion of a reconstituted socioculturally mediated overview.1 In the sense that it is a theory, it is an overview;

yet because it is not a detached overview but rather a socially mediating activity,

it is engaged, and it is praxis. lt is in this sense that one speaks of the artist-asanthropologist's theory as praxis. There obviously are structural similarities

between an 'anthropologized art' and philosophy in their relationship with

society ( they both depict it - making the social reality conceivable) yet art is

manifested in praxis; it 'depicts' while it alters society.2 And its growth as a

182// DOCUMENTARY STYLE AND ETHNOGRAPHY 

cultural reality is necessitated by a dialectical relationship with the activity's

historicity (cultural memory) and the social fabric of present-day reality. I ... I

7_ 8e(ause the anthropologist 1s outside of the culture which he studies he is not

a part of the community. This means whatever effect he has on the people he is

studying is similar to the effect of an act of nature. He is not part of lhe social

matrix. Whereas the artist, as anthropologist, is operating within the same

socio-cultural context from which he evolved. He is totally immersed, and has a

social impact. His activities embody the culture. Now one might ask, why not

have the anthropologist. as a professional, 'anthropologize' his own society?

Precisely because he is an anthropologist. Anthropology, as it is popularly

conceived, is a science. The scientist, as a professional, is dis-engaged.1 Thus it is

the nature of anthropology that makes anthropologizing one's own society

difficult and probably impossible in terms of the task I am suggesting here. The

role Jam suggesting for art in this context is based on the difference between the

very basis of the two activities - what they mean as human activities. It is the

pervasiveness of 'artistic-like' activity in human society - past or present,

primitive or modern, which forces us to consider closely the nature of art. [ ... ]

9. Artistic activity consists of cultural fluency. When one talks of the artist as an

anthropologist one is talking of acquiring the kinds of tools that the

anthropologist has acquired - in so fa r as the anthropologist is concerned with

trying to obtain fluency in another culture. But the artist attempts to obtain

fluency in his own culture. For the artist, obtaining cultural fluency is a dialectical

process which, simply put, consists of attempting to affect the culture while he is

simultaneously learning from (and seeking the acceptance of) that same culture

which is affecting him. The artist's success is understood in terms of his praxis. Art

means praxis, so any art activity, including 'theoretical art' activity, is

praxiological. The reason why one has traditionally not considered the art

historian or critic as artist is that because of Modernism (Scientism) the critic and

art historian have always maintained a position outside of praxis (the attempt to

find objectivity has necessitated that) but in so doing they made culture nature.

This is one reason why artists have always felt alienated from art historians and

critics. Anthropologists have always attempted to discuss other cultures (that is,

become fluent in other cultures) and translate that understanding into sensical

forms which are understandable to the culture in which they are located (the

'ethnic' problem). As we said, the anthropologist has always had the problem of

being outside of the culture which he is studying. Now what may be interesting

about the artist-as-anthropologist is that the artist's activity is not outside, but a

mapping of an internalizing cultural activity in his own society. The artist-asKosuth//The Artist as Anthropologist// 183 

anthropologist may be able to accomplish what the anthropologist has always

failed at. A non-static 'depiction' of art's (and thereby culture's) operational

infrastructure is the aim of an anthropolog ized art. The hope for this

understanding of the human condition is not in the search for a religio-scientitic

'truth'. but rather to utilize the state of our constituted interaction. I ... J

Toe term 'implosion· was originally introduced into our conversation by Michael Baldwin. 1 refer

here to its use by Mel Ramsden in 'On Practice', this issue.

2 This nolion of ,m ·anthropologized art' is one I began working on over three years ago_ a point at

which I had been studying anthropology for only a year. and my model of an anthropologist was

a fairly academic one.

That model has continually changed. but not as much as it has in the past year through my studies

with Bob Scholte and Stanley Diamond (at the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social

Research}. While their influence is strongly felt, I obviously take full responsibility for the use (or

misuse) of their material within my discussion here.

3 l footnote 5 in source] I must point out here that the Marxist anthropology of Diamond and Scholte

is not included in this generalization. Indeed, due to the alternative anthropological tradition in

which they see themselves, their role as anthropologists necessitates that they be 'engaged'. It is

a consideration of their work. and what it has to say about the limits of anthropology (and the

study of culture) which has allowed me a further elucidation of my notion of the 'artist-asanthropologist'.

Joseph Kosuth, extract from 'The Artist as Anthropologist', The Fox. no. 1 (New York. 1975); reprinted

in Kosuth, Art after Philosophy and After: Selected Writings 1966- 1990(Cambridge, Massachusetts:

The MIT Press. 1991 } 117-24.

Stephen Willets

The Lurky Place//1978

Not far from the busy shopping centre of Hayes in West London, there exists a

large, seemingly abandoned, area of land known to the residents of surrounding

housing estates as the 'Lurky Place'. Completely hemmed in by various

manifestations of institutional society, the Lurky Place is a waste land, isolated

and contained. It is this symbolic separation from an institutionalized society

that gives the Lurky Place its value for local inhabitants. While the Lurky Place

is, of course, actually dependent on society for its existence, the local inhabitants

184//DOCUMENTARY STYLE AND ETHNOGRAPHY