Modern Quilt exhibit at Whatcom museum

Jeff and I finally made it to the Modern Quilt exhibit, just a couple of days before it closed.  So, since I didn't blog about it in time for others to go, I took lots of pictures so I could do an in-depth review.  I found it a fascinating exhibit and an interesting example of the art quilt world having its first major schism of a new school.  Makes me feel like we're real artists, doing split offs over small differences and everything.

The above sign was an interesting attempt, at least to me, to define the differences.  Of course, not all the quilts in the exhibit were bed quilts and thus not "functional" as the quilt world defines it thus lending support to my idea that this is an art schism in action.  Lest anyone think I disapprove of or dislike Modern Quilting, let me just say this was an exciting exhibit and if I were still making quilts, I'd be looking to the local guild for some community as I have yet to find a local art quilt group.  I use a lot of negative space, and my work is often described as graphic in sensibility.  And I think any of these quilts would fit in fine at an art quilt show.   But on to the actual quilts.

The exhibit started in the hallway leading to the exhibit hall so I got an early exposure to the quilts without benefit of signs explaining the guiding concepts.  This was good as Jeff and I got to discuss the differences from the quilts we usually see at art quilt shows and draw our own conclusions.  Jeff's father was an art professor so he has spent his life hearing artists talk about design and I've been going to quilt shows with him since the mid 90's so he is a very good discussion partner at this point.

The first quilt we saw was the most traditional quilt in the show, imho.  And that's Jeff standing in front of it.  Traditional blocks altho not a traditional setting and not bed size either.   As we progressed down the hall to the exhibition rooms, we saw many more interesting and clearly non traditional quilts.

My favorite of the ones in the hall still uses blocks but not in a traditional symmetrical way.  Lots of negative space and a lovely use of color are the things that caught my eye.  Again, not a bed quilt.

Jellyfish by Debbie Jones

Jeff preferred the more graphical and monochromatic piece that came next. A very nice wall piece and I also enjoyed the use of color in it.

Arctic Ice by Susan Oberwortmann

After a few more quilts in the hallway, we got to the exhibition rooms.  There were so many wonderful quilts that I'm going to limit myself to those that particularly appealed to me and demonstrated the differences of the Modern Quilt  approach.  These will tend to look a lot like art quilts with a geometric theme which makes me think of artists like Lisa Call, for example.

Modern Stepping Stones
by Heather Black, Spokane

The one below caught my eye because of the colors and the interesting use of circles.  I'm fond of circles myself and tend toward this blue in my personal work.  I also have a tendency toward diagonal movement in my work so this piece struck my eye.

Jeff picked out the next piece which we first saw from the back.  Here's the label which is on the lower left corner and we both got a good laugh from the line about entropy.  This view also gives a good closeup on the dense quilting which was quite striking.

Here's the overall quilting as seen on the back. 

And finally, the front. 

Bloberella
by Hillary Goodwin & Christa Withers

Here are the rest of the quilts I found notable.  This one had very interesting quilting with changes in the thickness of the threads used to accentuate the curves.

Smoke
by Kat Jones, Australia

Jungle Abstractions:  The Lion
by Violet Craft, Beaverton

And the last part of the exhibit was variations on a traditional block.  The explanation of the exhibit with credits is above, and the shot below is the art itself.  This particularly caught my eye as the annual benefit auction for SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Assoc.) is 12x12 art quilts and this collection of variations reminded me of the auction webpages.

An excellent and interesting exhibit and I am very glad we got to see it.