Artorias of the Abyss was released more than ten years ago but I still think about that one line of casual NPC dialogue from Marvelous Chester where he mentions the giant talking mushroom in Oolacile but delivers the lines in a weirdly sensual manner.
"‘Clem to death, and see ‘em a’ clem to death, ere yo’ dare go again th’ Union.’ Yo’ know it well, Nicholas, for a’ yo’re one on ‘em. Yo’ may be kind hearts, each separate; but once banded together, yo’ve no more pity for a man than a wild hunger-maddened wolf.”
Since the 19th century, the women of Gee’s Bend in southern Alabama have created stunning, vibrant quilts. In 2002, folk art collector, historian, and curator William Arnett organized an exhibition entitled "The Quilts of Gee's Bend," which debuted at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston and later travelled to a dozen other locations across the country, including our own Milwaukee Art Museum (September 27, 2003 - January 4, 2004). This exhibition brought fame to the quilts, and Arnett's foundation Souls Grown Deep Foundation continues to collect and organize exhibitions for Gee’s Bend Quilts.
The images shown here are from Gee’s Bend: The Women and Their Quilts, with essays by John Beardsley, William Arnett, Paul Arnett, and Jane Livingston, an introduction by Alvia Wardlaw, and a foreword by Peter Marzio. The book was published in 2002 by Tinwood Books, Atlanta, and published in conjunction with the 2002 exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. It includes 350 color illustrations and 30 black-and-white illustrations. The dust jacket notes observe:
The women of Gee’s Bend - a small, remote, black community in Alabama - have created hundreds of quilt masterpieces dating from the early twentieth century to the present. . . . [The] quilts carry forward an old and proud tradition of textiles made for home and family. They represent only a part of the rich body of African American quilts. But they are in a league by themselves. Few other places can boast the extent of Gee’s Bends’s artistic achievement, the result of geographical isolation and an unusual degree of cultural continuity. In few places elsewhere have works been found by three and sometimes four generations of women of the same family, or works that bear witness to visual conversations among community quilting groups and lineages.
Our copy is a gift from our friend and benefactor Suzy Ettinger.