12/30/2023 0 Comments Bisa butler quilts![]() ![]() ![]() "And this piece it talks to me about how our community loves our children."īutler trained as a painter at Howard University before getting her graduate degree at Montclair State University in New Jersey. "One boy, in the original, his foot is resting on a license plate but I love to show that he's so "clean", that even the soles of his shoes are clean," she laughs. The boys dressed in their Sunday best - suits and ties and hats - sit on a car on the South Side of Chicago. In one gallery, Butler, dressed in an African-print pantsuit as colorful as her portraits, stands in front of a quilt which she calls "Southside Sunday Morning." It's her version of the iconic photo by Russell Lee, called "Negro Boys on Easter Morning." Meya Garrett, 16, is a Collins Academy High School senior and was taken with the quilt of a 7-year-old girl, her hair tied in pigtails. "The breadth of the work, the details, the colors." Kamau Grantham, a clinical psychologist, toured the exhibit with his 9- and 12-year-old sons. The intricacy of the quilts - the billowy dresses for four little girls, the layered fabrics that make up a background - astonish many of the gallery visitors who pull out their cameras for pictures. "There's an opportunity there to kind of look at the work from so many different points of view." She uses fabric like paint to create something extraordinary And it's not like any other portrait I've ever seen," she says. "It's not like any other quilt I've ever seen. Warren says Butler's quilts resonate across the disciplines of painting, photography and textiles. The Art Institute's Associate Curator of Textiles, Erica Warren says the museum has been collecting quilts since the early 20th century and has a collection of about 230 of them. Her mother, from New Orleans, was raised in Morocco. Many come from Ghana, her father's homeland, and other African countries. Like a painter, Butler selects her palette –– a palette that consists of fabrics. So I want that to be acknowledged and I'll choose different fabrics depending on what the story is." "It is known that we have lineage and we come from people. "I'm thinking about color as a way to express inner emotions or personality traits and I'm selecting African fabric to talk about the fact that we are of African descent and we have a long history that was taken," Butler says. ![]() Like a painter, Butler selects her palette using fabrics from Ghana, her father's homeland, as well as other African countries. So this was the quilt that I made, in a way, to reinforce to myself that the kids would be fine." "He even has on a little cap, like he's an officer, but he is. "He's looking down his eyes at us," Butler says. The young boy in charge, holding his school mates back from crossing the street, wears a Nigerian batik print shirt. The life-size figures pulsate with their own individual vibrant hues. She worked on this quilt during her last year of teaching art to high schoolers in 2018. "Somehow I feel like they're calling out to me," Butler says. Photograph by Margaret FoxĪmong them is Butler's "Safety Patrol." The exhibit's opening quilt is her version of the 1947 photo of seven school children taken by preeminent African-American photographer Charles "Teenie" Harris. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |