Update on the Acanthus Design Source

Reading the Wall Street Journal daily doesn't usually generate a lot of excitement, although I must admit I always find something each day that intrigues me. And my reading definitely educates me about the present craziness in the world markets! Why else does one read read a particular magazine or newspaper so faithfully?  "Meat" or entertainment, right?

Today I let out a "whoop" that shot my husband's head up to attention. "What, What?!" he questioned.

"I've discovered another thread of history about the design of the acanthus plant on the antique quilt I bought a couple of months ago."

"Oh, ... ."

Ok, so my discovery isn't so exciting to someone who doesn't track down design sources found on quilts.

Nevertheless, he does understand my excitement for it is another piece of the puzzle in my research on this particular Four-Block acanthus quilt that I wrote about in this blog in June! Click here to see the earlier post about this quilt.

Christain Sahner, a Rhodes Scholar and doctoral candidate in history, writes in the first paragraph of his article "Temple of the 'Bride of the Desert,'"

Each night at sunset, the "bride of the desert," as she has been known for centuries, gets dressed for her wedding. In those last moments of daylight, she dons a robe of stunning colors—the buttery yellow of her limestone columns mixing with the blue shadows of her temples and the soft pinks of the desert floor. It is a scene that has inspired countless cultural suitors over the centuries, from Persians and Romans to Georgian Britons and Arab Nationalists. But could a new suitor materialize out of the current turmoil in Syria?


Powerful imagery!

James Dawkins and Robert Wood Discovering the Ruins of Palmyra - painted 1758,
 National Gallery of Scotland

Sahner goes on to write:

First settled in the third millennium B.C., the city made her fortunes as a trading depot. Silk, Palmyra's prized commodity, began its westward journey at the Indian port of Barbaricon, passing by boat to Seleucia and Babylon, before traveling by caravan to Palmyra, and then on to the Mediterranean coast.

Now he really had my attention because I like to weave the fascinating stories about ancient trade routes and the economic history of cotton into my lectures on the history of quilting.

The temple above was constructed around the turn of the first millennium A.D. and still dominates Palmyra and the modern city of Tadmor.  What caught my eye was the freeze along the top of the temples portico.

There was the acanthus plant again!  Sahner writes:

On the north side, there is a much-eroded zodiac motif, set within a detailed coffered ceiling. 


On the south side, a large acanthus medallion sprouts amid a field of stone rosettes, as delicate as on the day they were first chiseled. In the late 18th century, these designs found their way into the parlors of posh English homes, thanks to the sketches of the antiquarians James Dawkins and Robert Wood, who visited Palmyra in 1751.

This doesn't mean the design may not have been there earlier on some object imported from the Middle East, but here was a direct reference to this design being brought into England by two named individuals!

Compare it to the quilt's applique pattern once more.

Next: an update on the visit of Cathy and John Miller to Lopez Island and the quilt history Cathy sets to music and my visit to the Pacific West Quilt Show in Tacoma, Washington.

Cheers!

Karen Alexander

The Singing Quilter - Cathy Miller

In Concert with Cathy Miller 

Listen to Women's History set to Music 

at the Lopez Center for Community and the Arts!!

Come visit us on Lopez Island 

following the Pacific West Quilt Show in Tacoma!

Canadian singer/songwriter/storyteller Cathy Miller will be performing at the Lopez Island Community Center for the Arts, Sunday, August 28 at 4 pm. This program is sure to entertain and inspire both young and old, quilters and non-quilters alike.
 
Cathy used to be a folksinger with a slightly jazzy bent. She performed at folk festivals, clubs and house concerts all across Canada and released five CDs of her music. That was before quilting.
 
In 1991 Cathy was hired to write music for a play about quilting.  As part of her research, she took a class ­ and the rest, as they say, is history.  She now devotes her entire career to researching and writing songs about this fascinating art.  Why? Because often embedded in quilts, there are important human stories about love, death, immigration, hope, and community.  Cathy realized that no one was capturing these stories in song. She was uniquely qualified to take on this task.



Cathy is a stickler for detail. For her song A Quilt & A Kettle about the Oregon Trail experience of pioneer Rachel Bond, she worked with Portland/Lopez quilt historian Mary Bywater Cross to refine her wording. Cathy¹s husband, John Bunge accompanies her. He is a former member of The Gumboots from Yellowknife, a folk group that first formed in 1984 and performed both traditional Canadian folk songs and original songs about the North. 


Cathy is known for upbeat performances, which have made her an event favorite.  Cathy and John are a unique couple, traveling  the world, singing about the life of contemporary quilt makers as well as historic quilts. Cathy released her first CD of 12 quilt story songs, One Stitch at a Time, in September of 2000.
  The tales surrounding a quilt¹s history can be fascinating, and frequently tell a tale of women's lives and community life that don't often make it into the history books. Cathy delights in finding and writing songs about unusual and wonderful stories woven into quilts.

For her Lopez concert, Cathy will be performing songs that relate to World War II, western migration and other themes. The songs range from the historical, through the poignant, to the drop-dead funny!

Quilts will frame the concert setting, including several of Mary Bywater Cross’s woolen quilts. Mary's quilts will be available later on the Studio Tour. Featured will be the new Lopez Island Signature Quilt from the Lopez Island Historical Society. This visual record of island residents is the quilt style that leads creative minds like Cathy’s to write her songs. We’re eager to share it with her and the island community.

Please come and join us for a special late afternoon concert of stories set to music!


Karen B. Alexander

"You honor the life that has been given you by remembering and telling your stories."
Robin Moore's "Awakening the Hidden Storyteller"

My Blogs:

Quilt History Reports
http://karenquilt.blogspot.com/

Honorees of The Quilters Hall of Fame
http://thequiltershalloffame.blogspot.com/

Enchanted Quilters of Lopez Island
http://enchantedquiltersoflopezisland.blogspot.com/

Smocks is no longer smocks, they are shocks.

It is so entertaining to read the descriptions by earlier generations of women's fashions. 

I am writing this post simply because my attention was caught one day by the look of a worker's smock on a U.K. history website. (See first photo below.)

Source: http://www.reading.ac.uk/merl/the_collections/the_museum/smocks.html

The above photo of a farmer in a "smock" reminded me very much of a photo in our family archives. I immediately went digging and wa-la.....my grandmother in a very similar frock in 1921 shortly after my mother was born, only her smock is belted.

                                        

(Left, my grandparents Crystal [nee Pauley] Peebles and Robert Peebles with my mother Elizabeth (Betty) Peebles, almost spring 1921, Miami, WVA.)

Below is one image I found that very much resembles my grandmother's dress.

Source: http://www.fashion-era.com/visitor_pages/1917_shay_visitor.htm

Here is the American version of the British gentleman's smocked outfit I started with.

Above is amid-19th century smock from the Sturbridge Village collection.  

Source: http://www.lexingtonminutemen.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=12&Itemid=68

Then I got curious about the style and googled around until I stumbled across the article below. The transcription follows the photo of the article.

So, do you think the "designer" of the dress my grandmother has on was inspired by the farmer's garment?  Truth be told, howver, her dress is, unfortunately, not smocked.

                                         

Of Interest to Women

By MAROARRT MASON

(written for the United Press)

Dame Fashion knits a soldier's stocking: 

With the yarn that's left she does her

smocking.

Now don’t you think this very shocking? 

NEW YORK. July 15, 1916. 

Perhaps along Ellis Parker Butler's line of reasoning that "Pigs is Pigs," you think that "smocks is smocks." But you are wrong. Smocks is no longer smocks. They are shocks. There is a new hybrid race, flock or swarm of them in a tiny little box of a shop on Fifth avenue. It offers hats, too, but the smocks are the real curios.

They are not any of them what you would expect a well regulated smock to be. Each one is rather the embodiment of a wild flight of fancy, to put it mildly.

They start out all right and proper in linen, pongee, crepe or cretonne but then comes the funny business. Some of them are appliquéd in a mad hit or miss riot of gay, colored linen disks outline-stitched with yarn. Others are patched in crazy quilt fashion and feather stitched with yarn. Always there is yarn, yarn, yarn in some of every color, stitch or fashion. 

Some of the more decorous smocks have cut out patterns of the cretonne, baskets of flowers, birds or beasts appliqued at intervals around the skirt or on the pockets, and yet others have yarn crocheted scallops around the collar, cuffs and pockets. One of black satine is broken out so rashly in cart-sized and varicolored appliqued disks that it looks like a futurist companion piece to "A Nude Descending the Stairs." There are also some new sweaters or blazers quite as new as the smocks, but not quite so wierd. However, they put to shame for very stripedness both the zebra and the Sing-Sing habitant.

These striped sweater coats worn with the one-toned corduroy or linen skirt are a sort of vice versa flipflop or fashion from the one toned sweaters worn with awning striped skirts that were so omnipresent at the beginning of the season.

Although the stripes are riotous in their color effects, they are not so without rhyme or reason by any means. They are striped in regimental colors, and each daughter of the regi- ment may express by her coat of many colors her regimental preference. 

For the patriotic preparedness person there are the stripes of red, white and blue, and her sentiments as well as her figure may thus be embodied in her garment. Regimental colors are a deal more exclusive, however, and express a preference not quite so broad and promiscuous. Worn with white skirts these gray striped sweater coats are particularly stunning, and there also are accompanying accoutrements of hats and parasols striped to match.

The expression “Oh, she is that stripe,” hereby gathers a new meaning and the regimental sweater offers, as well as warmth and adornment, a delightful modern method of wearing your heart on your sleeve by wearing instead HIS stripes.

Verily, no regiment would fail to present arms to such color bearers.

Now wouldn't you just love to see some examples of those " appliquéd in a mad hit or miss riot of gay, colored linen disks outline-stitched with yarn. Others are patched in crazy quilt fashion and feather stitched with yarn. Always there is yarn, yarn, yarn in some of every color, stitch or fashion"?!

~~~~

I can sure tell I don't know a whole lot about the history of dress design! It took forever to find that plaid dress image that resembles my grandmotehr's dress.  Do check out the link for the plaid dress for some background for the era 1914-1920 in "ordinary" women's dresses.

Happy hunting to you in whatever kind of collecting or research you do!

Karen

Acanthus Plant - New Pattern Added to my Collection

Another Unusual Find

I had never seen this broad-leaf pattern (below) on a quilt prior to my find on eBay December 2010.This is a Four-Block quilt.

I am assuming the tan was once green but I can find no real evidence of it.  Even where the loose fabric enables me to get under the tan, there is no appearance of the green left.

The fact that the red has worn so unevenly makes me wonder if the red wasn't from two different dye lots.  Seems strange that some leaves held-up so well and others did not.

Below is a photo of a Corithn column with two ranks of stylized acanthus leaves.  Is that what this leaf is -- an interpretation of the acanthus plant?

Below is the leaf on the quilt side-by side with a large acanthus leaf.

Here are four different architectural variations of the acanthus in 

various periods of history.

You will often see this pattern in Moulded Ceilings as well. Click here to see some beautiful examples.

Below is another variation from a stair railing at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.

And still another column.

So far I have found two legends about the plant but there are probably more.

Acanthus. The acanthus plant grows throughout much of the Mediterranean region. Its large leaves appear in many ancient sculptures, especially on top of columns in the Greek style called Corinthian. Legends says that after a young girl's death, her nurse placed her possessions in a basket near her tomb. An acanthus plant grew around the basket and enclosed it. One day the sculptor Callimachus noticed this arrangement and was inspired to design the column ornament.

 http://www.mythencyclopedia.com/Pa-Pr/Plants-in-Mythology.html

As seen on a green wedgewood teapot.

From Wikipedia:


Acantha (Greek: Ἀκάνθα, English translation: "thorny") was a minor character in Greek mythology. She was a nymph loved by Apollo, the sun god. In one version of the story, Acantha refused Apollo's advances and scratched his face when he tried to rape her. Apollo then turned her into an acanthus plant.[1] Another version features Acantha as a mortal man who returned Apollo's advances.[2] The matter of Acantha's identity is further confused by the fact that the acanthus plant is not a tree, but a shrub or bush, and therefore is unlikely to have had a nymph associated with it. This may simply indicate that it was perceived to be a tree at the time the myth was created.

Here you see the use of this plant's pattern in clothing.

The little nine patch checkerboard at the intersections of the four blocks is a nice touch.

A second acanthus quilt pattern appears within 6 months!

Now came the real surprsie. I found another quilt made of this pattern just this week! It has the very same over-all loss of the green coloring to that same creamy tan!  They came from opposite coasts of the country. Oh how I wish there was some history of the source of these two pieces! Is it possible the two women knew each other and shared the pattern?

When I first spotted this  quilt I thought it had stains.Upon closer look, however, what looks like stains in this photo are actually those same "tan-looking" leaves.

I'd appreciate from hearing from anyone who has a photo of a quilt similar to this pattern or knows of a published source for this pattern.

UPDATE: Tim Latimer of Tim Latimer Quilts, etc sent me a link to another Acanthus plant whose leaf looks even more like this quilt's pattern! (Be sure to check out Tim's gorgeous quilting!)

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Macleaya_microcarpa_Habitus_BotGardBln0906b.jpg

PS: August 29, 2011

See an update to this design inspired by the acanthus plant by clicking here http://karenquilt.blogspot.com/2013/08/ancient-quilt-designs-from-ephesus.html.  

Will Red & White Spark the Next Revival?

An Important 40th Anniversary in Quilt History

Jonathan Holstein and Gail van der Hoof - 1971

Just as the 1971 Holstein-van der Hoof quilt exhibit "Abstract Design in American Quilts" at the Whitney Museum of American Art in NYC kicked off the late 20th century quilt revival, the recent Red & White quilt exhibit “Infinite Variety: Three Centuries of Red and White Quilts” held in NYC at the Park Avenue Armory may go down in quilt history as the defining moment for the next revival of interest in quilts....or at the very least, interest in creation of Red & White quilts.

(click on photo to enlarge)

 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kate-kelly/major-quilt-exhibit-spons_b_839490.html

(click on the article to enlarge)

Here is a link to an additional story about the owner of the quilts in this exhibit.  Her husband asked her what she wanted for her 80th birthday and she said she wanted him to underwrite an exhibit of her red and white quilts and open it free to the public!

http://tinyurl.com/5vv23os

Below are two videos of the red and white exhibit with lovely music. Almost like being there!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XK99ct7o5s (4 mins)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV0e7HfB_yo&feature=related  (8 mins)

Here is still another link that presents a short brochure which can be printed page by page.  Just click on the story lead next to the photo of the exhibit.

http://www.1stdibs.com/index.php?tsid=2164

I think Quilts in the Barn ahs the best set of photographs that I have yet seen.  Click here to view Linda's blog.  Click here for a flickr link to still more photos.

The exhibit design world has been almost as excited about this exhibit as we quilters have been.  http://www.metropolismag.com/pov/20110329/exhibition-design-in-the-app-age=

A RED & WHITE CHALLENGE

Author, designer, quilt teacher Pat Sloan has created a blog post archiving all the websites and blogs and news articles she has found as well of this exhibit.  Her blog is worth visiting and bookmarking for future stories in addition to a sense of immediate pleasure. 

Pat is also going to be issuing a 'Make a Red and White' Challenge in the near future.. so if you're anxious to make a Red and White quilt, be sure to keep track of her challenge on her blog.

You can also see a photo of Joanna Rose, owner of the Red & White quilts at the Park Avenue Armory exhibit on Pat's website.

http://patsloan.typepad.com/pat_sloan_red_and_white/

Here is one quilter from Indiana who has already made her new Red & White quilt!  See story here.

photo by Rod Rowe

Clair Baker of Middlebury, Indiana, is pictured in front of her “vortex” quilt she made this

winter, with Nick Hoffman, former director of the Elkhart County Historical Museum.

You can see my two blogs about Red & White quilts in my collection here.

March 13 post - http://karenquilt.blogspot.com/2011/03/what-is-ulster-inspired-quilt.html

March 7 - http://karenquilt.blogspot.com/2011/03/new-york-celebrates-red-and-white.html

Enjoy!

Karen Alexander in the Islands

PS: Watch for an article on the 40th anniversary of the 1971 Whitney exhibit and Jonathan and Gail van der Hoof.

Threads of Feeling Exhibit Ends in London

What a powerful exhibit!

By John Styles

Accompanies an exhibition at the Foundling Museum, London 14 October 2010–6 March 2011

When mothers left babies at London’s Foundling Hospital in the mid-eighteenth century, the Hospital often retained a small token as a means of identification, usually a piece of fabric. These swatches of fabric now form Britain’s largest collection of everyday textiles from the eighteenth century. They include the whole range of fabrics worn by ordinary women, along with ribbons, embroidery and even some baby clothes. Beautiful and poignant, each scrap of material reflects the life of an infant child and that of its absent parent. The enthralling stories the fabrics tell about textiles, fashion, women’s skills, infant clothing and maternal emotion are the material of Threads of Feeling.  Read more here.

The above link will also give you an opportunity to order the exhibit catalogue.  Click here to read a review and responses to the exhibit. 

Karen in the Islands

What is an Ulster-inspired Quilt

My Most Intriguing 

Red and White Quilt

43x57

Purchased on eBay in Nov 2007. Came from an estate in central Illinois. 

The design of this crib quilt reminds me of some Ulster quilts I have seen photos of.  I'll add a little more to this post when I get back from my guild meeting.

July 2011 Update:  Here is a quilt very similar to my quit above in The Quilt Index.

http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=18-36-73E

Citation:
Bowman, Grandmother. Applique Hearts. 7-30-1988. From State Historical Society of Iowa, IQRP . Published in The Quilt Index, http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=18-36-73E. Accessed: 07/16/2011

Wanting to give this post its own search title and also wanting to continue the Red and White theme, I've moved the 2nd half of the last post into this spot.

March 2011 Update:

Okay, now to add some more information that may or may not relate to the above crib quilt in my collection.

A research paper by Valerie Wilson, "Quiltmaking in Counties Antrim and Down: Some Preliminary Findings from the Ulster Quilt Survey", appears in the 1991 Uncoverings, the journal of the American Quilt Study Group.  According to the article, at the time of the paper's publishing, Wilson was a Textile Assistant for the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum.  You can find a few quilts on their website but nothing like the quilts mentioned in Wilson's research paper. Too bad.

However, I have added two photos from the article below  PLUS photos of more quilts that I have found on eBay and other places that for one reason or another made me think of my crib quilt.

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Now for additional photos I have found and saved for study purposes.

eBay dealer gbest had the above quilt in 2007. It reminds me of the Ulster quilt above it shown in black & white.

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Found in state of Vermont (above) - source....AQSG member Sharon Waddell

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above - seen at Case Auction Lot 58_2008


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Size: 84 inches x75 inches
2011 eBay item: 390175677617        
Item location: Lancaster, PA

Seller description for the above quilt states : THIS ANTIQUE APPLIQUE HAWAIIAN QUILT FROM THE 1870'S, IN SOLID RED AND WHITE,  AN EXTRAORDINARY WORK OF ART.

~ ~ ~

Offered eBay dealer Mark French in 2011.

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Dealer Cindy Rennels had this quilt in 2010.

click here for source of above quilt 

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Also from quilt dealer Cindy Rennels but in 2011.

same source as above

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eBay find

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source for above quilt

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Sunburst source above

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above-source - eBay Jan 2010

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Above is a quilt Julie Silber and Jean Demeter of The Quilt Complex 

had for sale a couple of years ago. Check out more of their fabulous quilts here!

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Source "In Praise of Quilts" weekend at the 

Genesee Country Village Museum

by Lorie Stubbs

~ ~ ~

Source for the above - this is just one block from the quilt. I found the quilt on 

Betsy Talford's Rocky Mountain Quilts website in January 2010.

I have no conclusions. Just lots of questions!  

Please feel free to to contact me if you have photos of quilts resembling any of the above or know anything more about on-going research on Ulster quilts!

KarenQuilt in the Islands

PS: Update June 2011

This quilt was labeled "Hawaiian" by the eBay seller in June 2011.

PS2: 2015 December  

I have found another even better candidate for an Ulster inspired quilter, albeit, only a top.  Click here to see it.

The above blue quilt was brought home from Hawaii by a friend of the seller's father following WWII.

Read more about Hawaiian quilts by visiting the Bishop Museum Ethnology Collection clicking here.