Recycled Memories and Materials make fine art

Edna J. Patterson-Petty draws on memories, experiences, her heritage, her hometown, and recycles all into art quilts that she often constructs from recycled fabric and clothing. In this first photo of her fabric art "You Got Soul," you can spot a bit of an old blouse. In the second photo, her art piece "Your Love," includes a recycled silk jacket. The spider-like image is an old necklace someone had given her. The last photo, but certainly not the least, "Lady Sings the Blues" dresses the lady in a recycled blouse fabric. Edna explains that "I purchase old and broken jewelry from flea markets. If I see an interesting pattern in an old dress, etc. at the thrift store or Goodwill, then I use that in the art piece. I seldom purchase new fabric by the yard unless I'm creating a commissioned piece. In memory quilts, of course, it is recycled clothing."

Here's Edna's Story in her Own Words:

For me, art is like an old friend. It is always there during my trials and tribulations, during my good times. I honor it and nourish it and give thanks for it. I am truly blessed.

When recently, I was presented with Grand Center Visionary Arts award for ‘successful working artist’ and then the very next day I found out that I had been nominated by my peers for another award in the arts -- it was blessing heaped atop blessing. To receive recognition for doing something that I am truly passionate about and to know what my purpose in life is. Who could ask for more? Regardless of what life throws my way, I have been able to make a living doing something I love.

Neither of my parents were artistic, so I am not sure how far back in my gene pool my creative sparks began sprouting. I went from the first grade all the way through high school without any teacher, or students for that matter encouraging me as an artist. Now believe me, I didn’t know what an artist was and didn't until much later in my life.

I am the oldest of seven children, yet I never felt that I belonged. I enjoyed creating, I saw designs in the clouds and fascinating images in the trees. I found beauty in things that were not so beautiful. My siblings, two sisters, and three brothers’, enjoyed the typical things kids love, I guess. I do know that they all thought I was weird. I was a very quiet child; I kept to myself on most occasions. I did play with them and had fun doing so, but when the creative urge visited me, I would become lost in doodling. As I grew older I began writing poetry.

What I did as a child was soothing, it was my way of escaping into another world.

My love for working with fabric came very early in life. I assisted my mom to recycle our old clothing in preparation for her making quilts to keep us warm in the winter. I was in elementary school at the time. My job was to rip the worn garments apart, the zippers were placed in a large plastic bag and the buttons were placed in a large pickle jar.

I did not learn how to sew until I entered high school and that is where I learned to make my own clothing. My mom sewed by hand, she did not own or know how to use a sewing machine. Once I learned to sew by machine, I was able to teach her. Many years, and 4 children later, I attended college for the first time as an art major, and when I began in my fibers class the flood of memories returned of those early days of ripping apart old clothing and watching my mom create bed quilts.

I learned so many wonder things such as hand painting, vat dying, weaving, etc. I was in heaven. Having to do numerous fabric samples in class, I knew that I did not want to waste the fabric. That is when I started to re-assemble the fabric scraps into a ‘whole’ thing of wonder. Many of my much younger classmates would throw their samples away, and I would wait until everyone left class and returned later to forage through the trash to gather the tossed scraps. That was the beginning of my fabric art, and I still to this day recycle. Here are images of a few art quilts where I recycled old clothing.

I was born and raised in East St. Louis, IL. and still live and love here. It is an impoverished city, but it wasn’t always this way. Many people look at only the negative things about the city, and over look the good. My city is very rich in talent: people such as Ambassador McHenry; Jackie Joyner-Kersee, sports icon; Lorna Polk, at one time was appointed by Pres. Johnson over education. The first African American FBI agent is also from my city. My husband, a former Peace Corp Director of 4 countries in Africa, also added to the city's rich history. Yet few see the core of strength, only our demise.

My love of helping people led me also into a career in Art Therapy. I completed a double Masters’ degree while in college. Art therapy is counseling using the arts. Over the years I have combined the skills of my fine arts training, my art therapy skills, my mother wit, and intuitiveness and genuine care for people in to a unique way of doing creative workshops. I also apply those skills into my fabric art. I have constructed many memory/commemorative quilts to tell other peoples stories.

Last year I received a NAACP award for the Arts and have received many accolades for my involvement in the arts over the years. Such great blessings, and I don't take any thing for granted. But being asked to create a quilt for the Presidential Inauguration was the icing on the cake. I am still very excited about that.

To see more of Edna's stunning fabric art and learn more about her successes, visit her website and flicker photos. And there are a few surprises of non-fabric art to enjoy.

Remembering through cloth

I remember cuddling on cold winter nights beneath Mom's scrap quilts and spending time picking out the fabrics so familiar since Mom made most of our clothing. Scraps from her summer dresses, my 4-H projects, my school dress, blouse, grandma's dresses, they were all in that quilt. She filled in with scraps she inherited from her mother and she would tell me the stories behind those. It seemed like I never slept alone when I slept beneath all of those memories.

I see that some quilters have turned scrap quilts into memory quilts and have a busy business. They use photos, documents, favorite poems, and most of all fabric from the clothes of the one to be remembered. I can see how that would make a unique and valuable heirloom.

A special group has been formed to make quilts to memorialize our men and women killed in action in Iraq. Of course there are also the 9-11 Memorial quilts, the huge AIDs quilt and the list goes on and on.

Most of these are made using traditional patterns, patchwork, nine patch, or crazy quilt patterns for their basis. A few quilt artists have made memorial quilts that build upon symbolism and special memories which translate into beautiful and bittersweet pieces of art. Here's one example.

Other memory quilts may depict a vacation, a moment in time and are often landscape or based upon photos.

A look at the photo of Texture of Memory posted on Etsy, memory quilts take on many faces.

Let it all hang out

We are the sum of our parts. Not just SOME of our parts, but all. Which means, our memories are influenced by things we don't consciously remember or acknowledge. When making a memory quilt we need to put as many 'parts' of the life together. And see what appears.

If it is a memory quilt of your mother -- how appropriate since Mother's Day is around the corner. The photo shows Leslie Riley's journal quilt of her mother. And gives you an idea of one way of making a memory quilt.

Remember that Mom was first a child, a girl, a woman, a lover, a wife long before she was your mother.

Perhaps begin with a map of where she was born. A family tree, her favorite tree, whether she liked sitting under a tree and watching nature or preferred to experiment with foods in the kitchen. Who does she speak of fondly or with anger? What are her political leanings? Did she chain herself to a cause and carry a placard in the streets or did she quietly move to change the thinking of friends and family, raise her children to see the truth she embraced, or perhaps made an effort to ease the suffering under laws or inequalities she opposed? What era did she come of age?

How much do you know about your mother and her beliefs? What was her favorite color? What does that say about her? Did she like to let her natural beauty shine through or always wore lipstick and nail polish? Was she a war bride? What was happening in her world when she was making her life choices?

When I think of my mother, I see a flower garden quilt. She made several of those as well as the traditional double wedding ring, star of Bethlehem, and other star quilts. Why did she chose stars I wonder rather than log cabins or nine patch or basket quilts? Why do I think of flower gardens when I think of Mom? I think her major life decisions were influenced by her coming of age in the Great Depression. The flower garden quilt pattern was popular during that era and she had told of using feed bags as quilt patches.

The Great Depression caused her family's financial decline, their move into an apartment above the telephone and telegraph office in a nearby small farming town. It caused her to work for the telephone company as well as take a job waitressing in a diner to help care for her aging parents rather than marry. World War II took many of the men from the community and caused the women to shoulder more responsibility.

Because their apartment was located above a business in the heart of the town, she lived across from the hardware store and quickly met the owner's brother who had come to town looking for work and a new beginning.

And yes, that 'brother' became her husband and my father. Mom was also shaped by her religious beliefs, her church, her community of which her family had been members for generations leading back to when the land was first settled.

To make a memory quilt for Mom has to include so much more than photos of her and family photos. Maybe that's why I think landscape quilts make excellent memory quilts. We are never separated from the land -- whether it is covered with cement or tilled by a Massey Ferguson or a team of horses. And what happens on that land imprints us, leads us in the directions our lives will take.

Maybe we waste our time making memory quilts of others. We should work on our own. Mine must begin with a book, a library, a community. Typing lessons at the age of eight, learning to handle money and make change at the age of four -- both skills pushed me in a specific direction. Perhaps if we look closely at what made us who we are, we can make better choices when raising our children or influencing our grandchildren. Maybe a memory quilt needs to be a therapy, a way of finding out just who we are and why.

Collage certainly lends itself to that project. I'd love to see an exhibit of "Who I am" quilts.