GREENFIELD — Need more fiber in your diet — your cultural diet, that is? Then check out the art quilts on display now at the Twenty North Gallery.
The display is actually two exhibits in one: “Women’s Stories” from INfiber Art, a group of central Indiana artists, and “Coronart 2020,” presented by the Studio Art Quilt Association (SAQA), a collective dedicated to promoting art quilts as layered and stitched creative visual works.
The INfiber show comes to the Twenty North Gallery straight from an exhibit of quilts at the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art. Divided into three theme categories — Family/Friends/Personal Relationships, Ethnic and Regional Identity, and Political Agency and Power — the exhibit explores the experiences of women. The three categories are made up of six 16 x 20-inch quilt squares that make statements and voice opinions.
The Coronart display, assembled by regional members of the national SAQA group, features 30 quilt squares measuring 20 by 20 inches. Coronart grew out of a response to the COVID-19 virus and the lockdown which so affected millions of people worldwide.
Both shows, hanging in the gallery simultaneously, were coordinated by Hancock County art enthusiast Joan Webb. As a member of both groups, Joan has coordinated an annual fiber exhibit at Twenty North for the past five years.
Webb, who has been sewing since she was a child, made her first art quilt in 2002. Art quilts, by definition, use both traditional and modern techniques to create an object of art rather than a cover or blanket. Most art quilts are hung as works of art rather than placed on a bed.
Webb has a quilt in each of the dual exhibits. “Microscopic Might,” a bright orange and yellow creation, hangs on the Coronart side of the gallery. Webb enjoys dying her own fabric for her quilts. She outlined a detailed process that involves soaking the fabric in soda ash so it will more readily absorb the dye. You then add dye one color at a time.
“You never know what you’re going to get,” Webb said.
She admits to making a mistake with the dying process for “Microscopic Might.”
“I forgot to start with soda ash,” Webb said. She added it in later but was very happy with the results.
Another artist, Pamela Mick, not only has art hanging in the Twenty North Gallery, but also in a juried exhibition of national quilters at the Carnegie Center for Arts & History in New Albany. Her piece “Two Little Sisters,” is a blue and white silhouette of Mick’s daughter and granddaughters from a photograph taken on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Mick copied the photo by hand and then dye-painted it before quilting it. Beads, added to give the waves a sparkling diamond look, were the finishing touch.
Mick, who moved to Greenfield when she retired in 2016, is three years into a 10-year independent study workshop with master art quilter, Hollis Chatelain. She hopes to learn, among other things, design elements, how color choice drives your quilt and directs the viewer’s eye.
“As the artist, you want the viewer to question and continue on with maybe internalizing to tell the story that is most meaningful to them,” Mick said, “therefore creating a connection. Which to me is the truest form of success.”
Glancing around the room at the exhibit, it’s hard to miss Amy O’Connell’s rays of sun shining out from behind dark clouds. The piece is called “It’s Got to Get Better in a Little While, from a song by Eric Clapton.
O’Connell explains the inspiration behind the piece: “My husband plays in a band,” she said. “He was still able to do outdoor shows, but it’s about how music helped us get through 2020.”
The Twenty North Gallery will be open to the public from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. May 14 with an artists’ reception, refreshments and live music. Visit hancockcountyarts.com for more information.
