Oy! Aliens!
Originally uploaded by Mellicious.
Quilt above made by Linda Colsh; from the exhibit "QuiltArt at 10" at the 2005 International Quilt Festival.
I was reading Weeks' post about the Chicago Quilt Festival and thinking that I apparently walk some sort of line on these issues that is a tiny bit unusual. I wouldn't call myself a modernist, exactly. I wouldn't call myself a traditionalist, either. I definitely wouldn't call myself an art quilter. I like modern quilts a lot, and art quilts too (and I am crazy about the one above) - but I like traditional ones too. I've talked somewhere online before (although I don't think it was here, I think it was in somebody else's comments, actually) about how the quilt guild I belong to seems completely oblivious to the whole "modern quilt" thing - when I turned up with Weeks' book at retreat last fall, and started cutting out pieces for my Zipper Quilt, nobody acted like they had seen the book before or had ever heard of such a thing. And it's not like my guild is terribly tradition-bound, they're not at all. The people who picked up my book - and a whole lot of people did - really oohed and ahhed over the quilts. So it's not like they're resistant to it. This is just something that hasn't quite reached there yet. And I'm sympathetic to the way that the "modernist" quilters feel left out by the more traditional crowd. I don't blame them at all. And it really sucks not being able to be able to find the things you want for your craft.
Parenthetically, I hope nobody thinks I'm trying to disparage them by putting "modern quilts" and "modernist" in quotes - that's my little tic, I'm doing that because I'm not sure how crazy I am about them as a catch-all term for this movement. I think this may be an age-related thing, in part - I tend not to like the term too much because it was overused when I was young. I associate it with icky mass-produced "Danish modern" furniture, and ugly concrete buildings, and other things best left in the 60s. (Some of the stuff that was called "modern" then is now wonderfully, deliciously retro, of course. Some of it is, well, not.)
It's very typical of me to be on the fence about things like this. I tend not to fit into categories very well. I'm a modernist some of the time. I'm a traditionalist - sort of - some of the time. I'm just me.
(Just the same, Weeks, if you happen to be reading this, I would love to see you have a booth at quilt festival. I'd buy something!)
1 comment:
I totally get what you are saying about modern quilts (in quotes or not...) I am a "modern traditionalist" myself ;-) - I make quilts that are well grounded in the old tradition of quiltmaking, but tend to break free from the "rules" and do my own thing along the way. I don't feel I'm "arty" enough to call my more modern pieces "art quilts". But what are labels anyway? As long as I am fine with what I make and open minded enough to draw inspiration from traditional AND modern quilts, I'm happy ;-)
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