Thursday, February 20, 2014

Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell Quilt at Spencer

Beginning Again, 1980-1985
By Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell
Helen F. Spencer Museum of Art 
at the University of Kansas
Gift of Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell & Bill

The Personal Geometry exhibit at Lawrence's Spencer Museum of Art shows the quilts of Jean Mitchell and Yoshiko Jinzenji through May 18, 2014.


For programs, dates and times click here:

Details of Beginning Again
This piece celebrates the coming of spring, 
Easter and the yearly renewal of flora and fauna.




Wednesday, February 12, 2014

February Speaker: Jacquie Gering

See more of Jacquie's quilts at her blog

Jacquie Gering is our February speaker. She was once a member of KVQG before she moved to Chicago. She's well-known for her modern quilts and was recently elected Chairman of the Board of the Modern Quilt Guild.



The Wednesday workshop will be an all day lesson in machine-piecing and cutting hexagons.

Monday, February 10, 2014

Darke County Sampler Block 2

Flowers don't often sprout from shoes,
but here is a distinctive applique design
seen in the Miami County sampler quilts


The February block for the 2014 Block of the Month is
drawn from one of the many turn-of-the-last century samplers.

Notice the red shoe near the center of this
album top dated 1906 from the Quilt Complex

A detail



Detail from the Helman quilt


I've been collecting pictures of these samplers
for quite a while.

Above is a photocopy of an ad for a quilt lost nearly 30 years ago. It has the usual eagle plus a workbench full of tools, which you also see once in a while. Sue Cummings writes that these samplers were often gifts or presentation quilts for children coming of age. The tools might indicate a boy going into the carpentry trade. This missing quilt also features the typical pattern of blocks of different sizes with dark filler strips to fill out the rectangle.

Another photocopy from the files, this sampler dated 1908.
Notice the ax and saw on the left side here.
With only six patterns we don't have room for any tools.

The Helman Quilt from Sue Cummings's book

But we had to have the Flowering Shoe.

Your February guild newsletter has the pattern for rectangular block.


Sunday, February 2, 2014

Personal Geometry: Spencer Quilt Show Opens Saturday

Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell, detail of 
Bill Willie’s Factotum Whirligig 

Personal Geometry: 

Quilts by Yoshiko Jinzenji and Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell

Opens at the Spencer Museum at the University of Kansas this Saturday and will be on display from

February 8 through May 18, 2014.

Yoshiko Jinzenji
Detail of Color II

The exhibition pairs two artists’ work to reveal contrasts as well as continuities in their recent gifts of life-work donated to the Spencer's permanent collection. Jean Mitchell, a founding member of our guild, gave a collection of quilt blocks and patchwork tops in 2013. Yoshiko Jinzenji of Japan donated a similar yet very different collection of blocks and patchwork in 2007.

PROGRAMS

  • February 19, Wednesday. The Friends of the Art Museum will hold a reception for the artists from 5:30 to 7:30.

  • February 22, Saturday. Yoshiko Jinzenji will discuss her work at 2:00.

  • March 2, Sunday. Curator Susan Earle will guide a tour of the exhibit from 2:00 to 3:00.

  • March 15, Saturday. Children’s Programming. Saturday Art Adventure. Quilt Geometry, children 5-8. 10:30-11:30.

  • April 10, Thursday. Senior Session: Personal Geometry. Curator Susan Earle guides a gallery tour of the exhibit from 10:00 to 11:00. Senior Sessions are open to everyone but designed with the comfort of senior citizens in mind.

  • April 13, Sunday. 
  • New Directions/Historical Forms. Gallery Tour 2-3.
  • Quilt historian Barbara Brackman will give a gallery tour of the exhibit, discussing traditional needlework techniques behind these nontraditional quilts. We'll look at global influences from Japanese patchwork to English stumpwork through antique pieces from the Museum's collection and Barbara's.

  • April 15, Tuesday. 1:30. Virginia Jean Cox Mitchell will discuss her work at Spencer after the April KVQG meeting.


See more here: