Today our Executive Director/Curator Carrie Johnson tells us a little bit about “Strip Quilt” by Lorraine Pettway which was created in 1974. We are so lucky to have eight of these gorgeous Gee’s Bends Quilts in our Permanent Collection thanks to a donation by Jim Hager.

Gee’s Bend is a remote Black community in Alabama of around 700 people. The residents of this inland island (surrounded by the Alabama River on three sides) are mostly descendants of slaves having worked for generations the fields belonging to the local Pettway plantation. The women of this area have created hundreds of quilts dating from the early twentieth century to today. These quilts extend the expressive boundaries of the quilt genre and constitute a crucial chapter in the history of American art. They represent only a portion of the rich body of African American quilts, but quilts created here are in a league of their own. Not only are they revered for their imaginative and improvisational transformation of recycled work clothes and dresses, feed sacks and fabric remnants, but in few other places have works been found by up to four generations from the same family.

Our piece pictured behind Carrie in the video is by Lorraine Pettway: “I learnt how to quilt from my grandmother Virginia. She quilted on the machine a lot, and I had to hold the quilt while she was sewing it. I was on one end and she was on the other end. I liked to be with her. I learnt how to piece quilts all on my own. It come to me, just putting stuff together. And everybody started liking what I done and asking me how I could do that. I get old clothes and tear them up and make blocks and make pretty quilts. Quilting it is the easiest part. Making it is the hard part. Nothing to quilting it. How I start to make a quilt, all I do is start sewing, and it just come to me. My daughter ask me the other day what I was making, and I said, ‘I don't know yet; I'm just sewing pieces together,’ and the quilt looked pretty good. No pattern. I usually don't use a pattern, only my mind.”

Learn more about Lorraine Pettway and other Gee’s Bend Quilters at soulsgrowndeep.org.

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