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When they arrived Harriet’s parents were mixed with populations of slaves from other places and cultures of Africa. They had been brought from Africa as slaves carrying with them traditions of the regions they lived. One source of this African knowledge represented in Powers visions was through her parents. “The Fon people created large wall hangings in honor of their kings featuring appliqued animals like lions, buffaloes, bird, sharks - these symbolize the king’s identity.” (Michelle Cliff) She parallels these African traditions and storytelling with pictorial compositions containing animals within illustrated events. One fascinating association with Powers quilts are the appliqued cotton cloths and techniques made by the Fon people of the Republic of Benin in Africa. Powers weaved in her quilts narratives drawn from oral traditions through complex iconography in her detailed, colorful scenes. After the 1970s, quilting and other textile arts became elevated to fine or high art. It is the emergence of the folk art movement in the earlier part of the 20th century that inspired new found appreciation for aesthetic qualities of early needlework and quilting. The reason I refer to her as a “maker” is because quilters and needlework fell under the category of craft in this period exclusive of the canon of art in the 19th century.
HARRIET POWERS PICTORIAL QUILT SERIES
This involved sewing pieces of cut fabric on a background square, the series of squares are then sewn together, areas without a design were frequently quilted in a decorative pattern or border. “They are immersed with symbolism and charged by spirituality and the passion of the God she honors within her work.” (Michelle Cliff) Powers gives a voice to her life through appliques on quilts. What I want you to experience are surviving quilts she made that form an aesthetic divergent from traditional designs, imbued with strong colors, stripes, shapes, patterns, asymmetry and elements of African mythology.
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Like other black women slaves in their personal time at night by candlelight, she labored to provide practical clothing and bedcovers for her family.
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Quilts made by slave women were crafted during the daylight hours under the eye of their female owners, using Euro-American design traditions.
HARRIET POWERS PICTORIAL QUILT FREE
Harriet Powers was a black female maker and slave from Georgia, who transformed a traditional communal art, quilting, into a remarkably free and creative expression. She lives in Arlington, Virginia.Harriet Powers, “Pictorial Quilt,” 1895 (Image credit: Boston Museum of Fine Art) Hicks, a quilter whose works have appeared in over forty group exhibitions in places such as the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, NY and the Renwick Gallery in Washington, D.C. This I Accomplish: Harriet Powers¿ Bible Quilts and Other Pieces brings to light new, exciting facts ¿ many never before published: proof Powers was a literate, award-winning quilter, who stitched at least five quilts and promoted her own artwork complete exhibition history for both quilts profiles of the two nineteenth century women who sought to purchase the Bible Quilt profiles of the three men who once owned the Pictorial Quilt unveiling of a young artist who embellished the Pictorial Quilt and more! This I Accomplish is the most comprehensive resource guide on Powers and includes nearly 200 bibliographic annotative references. Until today, no one has told the entire, dramatic story of how her quilts, one initially sold for $5, were cherished for decades in private homes before emerging as priceless, national treasures.
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and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston have stood transfixed viewing her quilts. Thousands of visitors to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Her two-known creations, the Bible Quilt and the Pictorial Quilt, have independently survived since stitched more than a century ago.