1

fShare

Tweet

November 14 - February 3, 2013
Collecting Treasures: Celebrating 35 Years

The San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles-the first in the United States to focus exclusively on quilts and textiles-commemorates its thirty-five year anniversary with a large survey exhibition, Collecting Treasures: Celebrating 35 Years. Drawn exclusively from their permanent collection, it showcases important early and historic quilts, recent acquisitions of contemporary fiber art, as well as ethnic costume and textiles.

For more information regarding the exhibit, click here.

Highlights of the exhibit include:

• The first quilt accessioned into the collection (a Crazy Quilt, 1883-1884).

• A quilt by the wife of Francis Scott Key, author of "The Star Spangled Banner" (Grandmother's Flower Garden by Mary Tayloe Lloyd Key).

• A woven piece with a poignant message on the Gulf War but applicable to today's ongoing conflicts (Weep for the World, 1991 by Mary Balzer Buskirk)

• Drawing on the presidential election theme, a quilt with humorous caricatures of forty-two presidents from George Washington to George W. Bush (Presidents, by Dorothy Vance)

• A never-before-exhibited, oversized ritual dance costume from the Yoruba people of West Africa (The Egungun Ceremonial Garment).

• A contemporary ritual textile inspired by traditional Japanese by Yvonne Porcella (Firebird Kimono).

(Quilt: Pineapple Variation or Windmill Blades, c1890

Unknown Maker, American
Silk, velvet
Pieced, quilted
71 x 70
San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles, 2004.308
Donated by Jacklin Vanmechelen)