TREASURED MEMORIES BLUE BAR QUILTS October 2020

                                              Treasured Memories:

New Works by Members of the Memory Cloth Circle

October 1 -November 19 2020

Blue Bar Quilts 

6333 University Ave

Middleton WI

The Memory Cloth Circle began at Lakeside Coffee House during the 2013 MMOCA Triennial. Each week people signed up to tell stories and embroider memories. The group was inspired by Amazwi Abesifazane, Voices of Women, in South Africa. Those courageous women began making Memory Cloths to tell their stories of Apartheid; they asked us to share their process in the U.S. We honor them in our work choosing our own stories and messages.

When the 2013 MMOCA exhibition ended many of the Circle participants, buoyed by the group’s energy and creativity, decided to continue gathering; we meet weekly to this day. Today the Memory Cloth Circle brings together 20+ professional and non-professional women artists from various backgrounds. All enjoy sharing ideas, narratives, and stories in stitches using vintage and repurposed fabrics through embroidery, applique, collage, and mixed media. 

Since the pandemic halted in-person gatherings we have met weekly through Zoom, and we are delighted that this has allowed participation to include members in Oregon, Texas, Florida, Nova Scotia, and Tanzania.

Circle member Lisa Binkley has repurposed wooden cigar boxes in her mixed-media fiber art for years. Her father used to enjoy smoking cigars, and when she saw the beautiful boxes, he began saving them for her. He is delighted that they have been incorporated into her art as well as others’.

Many of us had a special box as a child that we used to hold treasured objects—found feathers and bones, shells and special beach pebbles, poems, old jewelry from a grandmother, and other gems. As our group considered possibilities for our 2020 exhibition at Blue Bar Quilts, we decided to tap into treasured memories and the idea of boxes to contain them. The boxes that are the foundation of works in this exhibition are cigar boxes from Lisa’s dad and a few other sources, wine boxes from his wine cellar, and a world of fabrics, threads, beads, photographs, jewelry, lots of hand stitches, and messages and memories. Enjoy.

TREASURED MEMORIES Ann Engelman

                                                                    Ann Engelman

Garden Memories

This box, created over several months, collected memories from my Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin garden of 19 years and bits from my gardens and garden collections. The end of the dining room table became the repository for all options and was a tableau in itself. From this I began to picture three panels that would embody the joy I get from my gardens.

I want you, a visitor to my garden memories, to be able to open the box and pull out the little hand stamped accordion book that holds my memories. The text, in case you do not feel comfortable doing this is:

Won’t you come into my garden?

I would like my flowers to meet you.

White picket fence garden is the smile of the house,

many birds and bird songs, Zinnia garden,

mailbox for tools, decorated compost bin, shade garden,

growing good soil, bottom garden, pollinator gardens,

Mary garden, meadow, beauty of the river, lavender,

Jeramiah the Bullfrog, peonies, the wishing frog,

Scented Geraniums, little library, Engelman Ivy,

gardens books, cut out pictures, seed catalogues,

plants from friends, kitten Zoe found in the garden,

Carol in the garden, the pond, goldfish, woodpeckers,

flood of 2008, rooster Victor and the girls, oxalis,

Great Horned owl at dusk in the lawn, the long view,

Sweet Annie, Quaker Bonnet lily, pollinator garden,

shade garden, Bird Girl, Monarch chrysalis, herbs,

Burr Oak seedling, Aries the goat, garden path, chimes,

destination benches, view of the bridge, fallen Mulberry.

                        Ann Engelman GARDEN MEMORIES

TREASURED MEMORIES Lisa Binkley

                                                                     Lisa Binkley

The Happy Wanderer

For the first several decades of my life my father’s parents lived in the woods of Wisconsin, and my mother’s parents lived on the edge of Rocky Mountain National Park outside of Estes Park, Colorado. My grandpa’s sister lived “next door” to them (about ¼ mile away). We visited my father’s parents often and played alongside Honey Creek, in the fields, and in the woods. We visited my mother’s parents every summer for a week or two, and my two sisters and I loved climbing the huge rocks surrounding their home and spending as much time as possible outdoors.

The photo is of a painting a friend made for my grandparents of their Colorado home. My grandpa built the playhouse for my sisters and me and for our cousins. We’d play house in there and sometimes camp out overnight. My grandma always had creative projects for us while we visited, especially making artistic notecards and building doll houses. She was an accomplished seamstress, embroiderer, and knitter, and she made these two outfits for my Barbie Dolls. She taught me to embroider.

My sisters and I loved to collect pieces of rose quartz we found around their property and in the crushed gravel roads connecting the rural cluster of homes near theirs. I remember being fascinated by the beauty of the quartz, the layers of mica we found embedded in rocks and in the road, the grey-green lichen growing on many rocks, including the rocks surrounding my great aunt’s fireplace (which she kept alive by periodically spraying them with beer!), the hummingbird feeders, the saltlick for deer, and the many elk antlers my grandpa found. He made buttons from some of them for a knitting shop in town.

Each visit to Colorado included a trip to Charlie Eagle Plume’s—a nearby shop and gallery/museum owned by Charles Eagle Plume, who was a college classmate of my great aunt’s. He was a kind and fascinating man, and I remember him giving my sisters and me arrowheads and once strung seed bead necklaces that we treasured.

One year our trip to Estes Park included a stay in Yellowstone National Park, where I saw the one and only moose I’ve seen in the wild. That and the colors inside of the geysers are my most vivid memories of Yellowstone.

As my sisters and I played outdoors in Colorado and in Wisconsin, we loved singing several songs we’d learned in Girl Scouts. One of our favorites was The Happy Wanderer (I love to go a-wandering along the mountain track / And as I go I love to sing, my knapsack on my back. Valderi, valdera, valderi, valdera-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha Valderi, valdera, my knapsack on my back…)To this day, walking in woods, hills, and mountains, and along lakes and streams brings me immense peace and joy. I am still a happy wanderer.

As my grandparents aged, they began spending winters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and I have wonderful memories of the colors, cultures, architecture, and art I got to experience on several visits there to see them.

Looking back now on all of these memories I am warmed by their beauty and fondness and immensely grateful to have had these treasured experiences.

 

September, 2020

TREASURED MEMORIES Suzy Roth

 Suzy Roth

Solemn Communion  1917

Agnes Crescentia Hooyman 

12 years old

Freedom, Wisconsin

 

The ceremony of solemn communion included rituals such as the renewal of baptismal promises, the lighting of candles and a consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary. White clothing was worn as a symbol of innocence and purity.  Children were given prayer books, rosaries and holy cards as well as a certificate of First Holy Communion. 

 

Immaculate Heart of Mary

 

The image is simple, but the symbolism behind it is deep.

 

First of all, Mary’s heart is visible outside of her body. This points to her undying love for all people. Her love is such that she cannot contain it. 

 

Secondly, her heart is on fire, which emphasizes the intensity of her love 

for God and for humanity.

 

Next, there are white roses encircling her heart. These symbolize her purity, brought about by her Immaculate Conception, creating within her a most pure heart. 

 

Last of all, her heart is surrounded by rays of light, symbolizing Mary as 

a woman clothed with the sun.

This memory box was created in honor of my grandmother

 Agnes VandenHeuvel.

 

TREASURED MEMORIES Cynthia Quinn

 Cynthia Quinn

Low Tide

 

Visiting the tide pools on the Oregon shoreline, plus a month-long trip to the Greek islands were the genesis of an ocean series I’ve been working on for several years. These environments and the creatures who inhabit them inspire me to retell my delight in experiencing them by hand stitching with a variety of fabrics, threads and beads. Using a cigar box as the stage for this piece challenged me to “think outside the box,” as I planned how to use the space. I was able to use the box open vertically to create a wave effect in the hand sewn fabric. The shoreline at the bottom spills out of the box edge while the deeper water is at the top. I made many crocheted pieces to add a dimensional effect.

TREASURED MEMORIES Leslee Nelson

 Leslee Nelson

The New Day

 

Saris, hand-dyed embroidery floss, gold thread, cigar box from Lisa.

My daughter Riah and her husband came to visit for Spring Break.  

They were here to keep us safe during Shelter-in-Place. They went 

to the store and did all the cooking.  They are excellent cooks and 

made wonderful dinners. They also rearranged the cupboards and 

ordered cooking equipment they liked.  As I stayed out of their way, 

it brought up little frictions leading to irritations and memories of 

conflicts from her childhood.

 

I began stitching pillow covers for our sofa from several saris I’d 

bought in India. I used a repetitive running stitch called Kantha in 

India.  It was soothing and meditative. I made nine.

 

The underlying tensions broke into a yelling fight in June. Kaylee, 

our younger daughter was visiting that week.  She became the 

mediator.  Riah and I sat on the couch (covered in sari pillows) on 

each side of her as she guided the conversation.  Riah and I were 

able to finally recognize the patterns and issues of years-old conflict.

 

It was like a new dawn. Riah and I found a deeper understanding and 

let go of our misinterpretations and resentments. Kaylee was brilliant.

 Riah and I found resolution.  It was transformative. 

 

This was my most treasured moment from Covid Summer.

 

TREASURED MEMORIES Marilee Wertlake

 Marilee Wertlake

My Mother’s Treasure Box . . . of Little Sins

Materials Botanically dyed cloth by artist - Lisa Binkley class

Hand-dyed cotton - Blue Bar Quilts

Silk velvet – Gay Feather Fabrics

Jewelry - Elizabeth Silverman collection

Cigar Box (courtesy of Madura Cigars)

My mother had a wonderful jewelry collection that had grown over time. As a child, I had spent hours (usually while waiting as my mother was getting ready to go out) sorting, inspecting, trying on and admiring her jewelry. She had great taste. Precious & semiprecious gems, gold & silver, trade beads, amber, vintage costume jewelry . . . she loved it all. About a month before I got married, I went home to visit my mother and sisters. So there I was once again looking through her jewelry boxes, waiting for her to finish dressing and asking her questions about her jewelry collection. I believe I was looking at her old nursing watch, which was extremely tiny, and her original, very modest wedding band, and was asking her a question about why these were so plain (jewelry serves as a certain kind of family history – this ring was your Grandmother’s, this pin belonged to your Aunt, this was the wedding ring from my first marriage). “Well,” she began, “you know that some Seventh Day Adventists consider jewelry prideful, a kind of sin . . .” [Now, I did know that, having been raised in the faith while young. I also knew that some Adventists exchange watches instead of rings when they get married because of that belief, but I had never really thought about jewelry as a sin in the context of my mother’s jewelry!] “So you see,” she continued, “those had to be modest, because I was getting married as an Adventist. But all my other jewelry? That’s my treasure box of little sins!” And that’s how I’ve thought of it ever since.