Quilts as art?

I stole an hour the other day, and went to the Springville Museum of Art. It's housed in a beautiful old Spanish style building near the center of town, and in the past I've catered wedding receptions inside. It's a popular choice. When I go, I always take a little time outside first looking at the gardens.

They have a great collection of perennials supplemented with annuals. This time of year most have gone to seed pods, but I still like the textures. 

 Once I got inside, I was happy to see I hadn't missed this year's quilt show. It may surprise people from other parts of the country, but there is some great artwork done in this format. Above, the wall quilt has got the feeling of the canyon I love running and biking in although it is based off of somewhere back east. 

 I love the blazing border fabric on this large quilt -- and the happy sunset town. 

 I also like the kind of random feel of the shapes in this Japanese style quilt, and how the quilting builds a rattan-like texture around the other color. 

 This wall hanging made me wish I had grown up to be a hippie in a VW bus living on nuts and seeds. I'm hoping I can get this across: when I was a little kid and took dance classes, they had a water cooler with these paper cups with a flower print on them that looked a little like this hanging --not much. Anyway, I remember staring at the print on that paper cup and thinking about the field where those flowers grew, and wishing I could live in that field. When I thought of free spirits, and gypsies and hippies later on, I associated them with that field and have always felt a little bit jealous. Don't think I'm too weird OK? We all want a little less responsibility in our lives sometimes right?

 This artist went way out there. I took this picture for the kids to see. They used real shells and sea-stars along with extra fibers, embroidery, quilting and piecing to get the depth of effect and layers in this wall hanging. 

 This artist stated that he was new to the medium, and so drew heavily on techniques he used in stained glass, which he'd worked with before. I could easily see that here. 

 I liked the composition of this quilt, but what made it amazing was what I saw when I got up close:

Not only quilted, but embroidered designs. Just lovely.

This artist said she was inspired by the random circles of a rug she saw, and then drew her own design. Ironically, it is really HARD to make anything look random.  

 This was an absolutely gorgeous quilt. I probably should have taken a detail shot too, but it's the overall effect that I loved. 

 The museum had a pretty detailed bio of the maker of the quilt (with a really bad picture! unfortunate lighting!) who had recently passed away. It reminded me of the New Testament lady Dorcas in the book of Acts who died and all of the widows showed all of her clothing and good works she had done and made while she was alive, and then Peter raised her from the dead. This was another one of these ladies. 

 In addition to the quilt show, they had a big exhibit of Soviet era art upstairs. I will spare you all of the military art and just show two that I liked. Here's the first. For a woman who hefts such huge loaves into and out of an oven regularly, she's a graceful, well proportioned looking thing isn't she? That's good weight-lifting for you! Those are HUGE loaves. She must have a big family. Or, maybe that was their main food source for the day. I like how the artist included the child in the picture too --like acknowledging the nurture involved in her work. 

 I was drawn to this one because it reminded me of snowshoeing up Whiting Canyon. All of that snow on the trees, but then the cheerful sunshine up ahead. 

Now look up close. All of that sunshine? About four brushstrokes created it. How did he do that?

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