From Exhibit to Auction

As I’ve mentioned previously, my parents are in their 90s and recently moved into senior living. Mike and I are in the process of going through their condo and getting it ready to sell. Over the years my parents have “collected” many of my quilts. Whenever one struck their fancy I was happy to gift it to them and Mom and Dad found places for each item. While moving them, some of the quilts went to be in their new living quarters, some went to family members, but there were quite a few wallhangings that no one claimed ~ and I can’t keep them all. So I decided it would be wise to donate them to the Wisconsin Museum of Quilts and Fiber Art‘s upcoming fundraiser auction.

They are accepting donations until January 30th, so we needed to make a trip to Cedarburg. It was a great opportunity to explore their current exhibit: “Wit/Whim” and it was delightful!

As we entered the doors we were intrigued by some interesting knit pieces by Yr Johannsdottir. I’d forgotten to take photos of the quilts I was donating and decided to pull up a few chairs and spread out my quilts between two pieces of her work ~ the sweater with a face named ULLA, and the tree of snakes (sorry I don’t know the actual name, as I forgot to photograph the sign).The rest of the pieces on the chairs are those I donated to the auction (the one that looks all white is a hand quilted wholecloth).

Once I filled out the forms and handed over the quilts, Mike and I were very interested in seeing the rest of the exhibit. As we walked through the doors I was drawn to an amazing tree growing in the corner of the gallery! It’s entitled “From Gardens Where We Feel Secure”.

It was such an imaginative combination of knitting, crocheting, found objects, lights, mirrors, and more. I walked beneath it and couldn’t resist snapping a pic of the branches above.

Here’s the sign – and don’t miss the last paragraph. What fun!

The rest of the exhibit was just as intriguing. Here are a few more of my favorite pieces. I apologize for not taking a photo of the sign for this piece. It is fascinating.

This one is named “25,000 Moments”

These “Wiggle Quilts” really intrigued me because I’ve played with a similar idea in some of my quilts.

Sew … Luke started with two quilts: one an antique, and the other one he made from salvaged textiles. He then cut an identical shape from each and swapped them into the opposite quilt. I’ve made a number of quilts in my “Quilt-Slash-Create” series in a similar fashion.

This is part of a post I wrote about it:

A number of years ago I read an article about cutting identical portions out of two quilts, and swapping them. This intrigued me, so I decided to try it. I had been given a bag of leftover pieced squares in an art quilt challenge. I decided to piece them into a small square quilt. I then cut a piece of a beautiful hand-dyed fabric the same size. I layered both pieces separately, and quilted them identically. Once they were squared up, I stacked them and rotary cut a circle through both quilts. After separating the quilts, I swapped out the circles and zig-zagged them into their new “home”. That was fun, so I stacked them and made another cut. This continued until it felt done, and I was quite pleased with the results!

I wonder if that article I read back then was about Luke’s work. I actually taught a class on this technique at the Great Wisconsin Quilt Show in Madison a few years ago. Here’s one more set of quilts from that series.

I’ll warn you, it can be addicting.

Oh no ~ I went down a rabbit hole and wandered away from my original topic 😁! Sorry.

In conclusion, if you want to see the “Wit/Whim” exhibit at the museum, you’ll need to move quickly because it only runs through August 10th. And if you want to support the museum through their online auction it will be open from 12pm on Thursday, August 21st through 2pm on Monday, August 25th. I’ll post a reminder as the time gets closer.