| Gee's
Bend: The Architecture of the Quilt
This exhibition takes a fresh look at the quilting traditions
in the community of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, introducing new
artists and motifs in works dating from the early twentieth century
through 2005.
Presented are approximately seventy-four extraordinary quilts
that demonstrate how the artists play upon the structure or "architecture"
of traditional quilt patterns. Each quilt is unique, yet shares
a common visual vocabulary with others made in Gee’s Bend.
With newly discovered work from the 1930s to the 1980s, as well
as more recent designs by established quiltmakers and the younger
generation they have inspired, the exhibition documents the development
of key patterns—such as housetop, courthouse steps, flying
geese, and strip quilting—through outstanding examples.
Calder Jewelry
Recognized as one of America’s most innovative
modern artists, Alexander Calder (1898–1976) redefined sculpture
through his iconic mobiles, stabiles, and the popular Cirque Calder.
Calder’s work in metal jewelry, however, is one form of
his artistic output that is less known. Throughout his life, the
artist produced more than 1,800 jewelry works of art, each made
entirely by hand. This is the first exhibition devoted exclusively
to his unique body of jewelry work, and consists of approximately
one hundred objects, including necklaces, bracelets, brooches,
earrings, and tiaras.
Calder’s love of abstraction was incorporated into all
of his sculptural work, and his jewelry was no exception—it
is this abstraction that sets the jewelry apart. Several pieces,
when worn, cause the wearer and the jewelry to become conjoined.
In other instances, the mere act of wearing the jewelry initiates
a performance, sometimes caused by the pure fantasy of the jewelry
itself or the activation of a necklace or earrings by the wearer’s
movement, as if the jewelry were a mobile for the body. Calder’s
largest and unwieldy pieces might best be described as “unwearable
jewelry.” His jewelry has the same linear yet three-dimensional
aspect as his mobiles, and the parts that compose each piece are
hammered, shaped, chiseled, and composed in a fashion that precisely
echoes the artist’s creation of his sculpture.
Calder created personalized pieces of jewelry for family, friends,
and acquaintances by implementing monogram or shaping names into
decorative patterns. He also displayed and sold his jewelry through
trunk shows and gallery exhibits. His well-designed jewelry, made
of nonprecious materials, was reasonably priced; however, Calder’s
distinctive jewelry was not conventional adornment for the average
woman.
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