Last days: Quilts 1700-1945

Quilts stimulate memories of warmth, comfort and security. They are familiar objects, yet carry a range of hidden histories and untold stories about textiles, women’s creativity and individual families. British quilts were often intended for display as much as for use in the bedroom. Whether exchanged as commodities, made in professional workshops or created in…

Wartime quilts share the spirit of modern day fashion recycling

Carla Binotto and Carla van Lunn, designers from Brisbane’s Maison Briz Vegas talked about their 100% recycled French rubbish – transforming secondhand clothing into designer fashion through craft at a recent Quilts Sunday Stitch-Ups public program. ‘Quilts 1700–1945′ is on display at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) until 22 September. If you have visited the ‘Quilts 1700-1945′…

The Quilt

There is something about quilts that inspires an emotional and very personal response, and through-out the exhibition ‘Quilts 1700-1945’, you can hear visitors talking about people and objects from their childhoods that have been evoked by the objects on display. The Gallery has also received a significant amount of correspondence in relation to the exhibition…

‘Of chaos and bits and pieces’ Ruth Stoneley’s memory quilt

Since the 1970s, quilting and other traditional art forms have regained popularity in Australia. Complementing the ‘Quilts 1700–1945’ exhibition, the Gallery presents ‘Ruth Stoneley: A Stitch in Time’, a selection of textile works by this Queensland artist. Annette Brown writes on Stoneley’s exquisite memory quilt. For visual arts practitioners of the late twentieth and early…

Popular Prints and Patchwork in 18th – 19th century Britain

In his political sonnet England in 1819 the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) described King George III (1738-1820) as “an old, mad, blind, despised and dying king”. Working some 20 years prior the unknown maker of the patchwork Coverlet with King George III Reviewing the Troops 1803-05, held a very different, although no…

Take a walk through historic British textiles 1700-1945

Following the opening weekend of events and the first bustling weeks of ‘Quilts 1700-1945’, I feel like it’s a good time to sit down with a cup of milky English breakfast tea and describe how this extraordinary exhibition of historic British textiles has come together over the past few weeks. In the lead up to…