Some of these voices have long been silenced by illiteracy, exhaustion, racial oppression, and gender inequity. But if we know how to listen, we can understand what the quilts are saying. They speak of skill and power. They speak of economy and ingenuity. They speak of memory and forgetting. They reveal the experiences of women whose lives skirted the periphery of written history. What can quilts tell us about their makers? What can they tell us about ourselves?
Rachel Ray, a member of the Cedar Grove Quilters, enjoys quilting and has created several pieces for her children, grand children and great grand children. She is one of the featured quilters leading up to the QuiltSpeak exhibit that will open May 4 at the North Carolina Museum.
In this edition of QuiltSpeak: Stories Behind The Quilts, Andre Taylor talks about a handmade quilt that was made for he and his wife as a wedding gift. The quilt was made by his wife's God mother, Linda Taylor.
Diana Bell-Kite, curator behind the QuiltSpeak exhibit, gives a little background on how the exhibit came to be and what the public can learn.
Paige Myers, textile conservator at the NC Museum of History takes us behind the scenes of the QuiltSpeak exhibit to show us how the quilts are being prepared for opening day.