The Needle Tells the Story
Artist:
Kim F. Hall
Dimensions:
Materials:
Vintage crazy quilt blocks with lace and additional hand embroidery and embellishments (the artist’s father’s cufflinks and her own old jewelry). Backed with modern silk.
Quilt Story:
Kim F. Hall: In 2023 the Maryland Center for History and Culture (MCHC) acquired its first quilt known to be by a Black quilter: Abstract #1 by Baltimore artist Elizabeth Talford Scott. The African American Quilters of Baltimore (AAQB) participated in a citywide celebration of this Baltimore artist, creating a challenge for us to make mini quilts with “stories” in response to Scott’s work. Her stories were often in the form of poetry, so I tried to write my first-ever poem.
During the pandemic, my mother and I attended several online guild meetings and lectures where white quilt historians insisted that Black women in the 1800s didn’t have the skills or access to the fine materials needed to make crazy quilts, which tend to be made of the expensive materials and are full of “unnecessary” flourishes like embroidery and painting. Mom gets very frustrated when people overlook or erase “elite” Black talent, particularly in needlework. After these events, she would say “you need to write to her” or “you need to write an article about this.” Struggling with health challenges and desperate to finish my academic book, I always laughed it off. But the AAQB challenge sent me on a hunt for Black women who either made crazy quilts or showed evidence of finely honed skills. Gladys-Marie Fry's Stitched from the Soul: Slave Quilts from the Antebellum South and Mary Madison’s Plantation Slave Weavers Remember: An Oral History were really eye-opening. I then embroidered their names on a vintage crazy quilt block my mom gifted to me about twenty years ago. I didn't know about "shattering" where fabric made with certain dyes would disintegrate if handled too much, so I had to replace some of the sections without disturbing the embroidery. The ”Ant in Pants” near the center of the quilt is a homage to Catherine Wooten and the embroidered floral motif is copied from a quilt made by an enslaved boy in the 1860s.
My Story
by Kim F. Hall