Paducah's Men in Quilts

One of the artistic highlights of our recent Great Square Route around the eastern U.S. (MN - MS - GA - CT - MN) was the stunning Museum of the American Quilting Society in Paducah, Kentucky, which had just opened a special exhibit, 4 Guys & Their Quilts:

On exhibit May 16-August 12, these quilts combine the talents of four male award-winning quilters: John Flynn, Gerald E. Roy, Arturo Alonzo Sandoval and Ricky Tims. MAQS Curator of Collection Judy Schwender is proud to bring lesser known viewpoints from the quilting world to the Museum’s visitors.

“Any quilt reveals the sensibilities of its maker, and men bring perspectives to quilting that are unique to the medium,” Schwender explains. “Within the world of quilting, men are a minority, and the museum is committed to presenting quilting viewpoints of underserved populations.”

My favorite among the 4 Guys was Ricky Tims, whose work ranges from exquisite variations on traditional quilting patterns, like his Bohemian Rhapsody or New World Symphony, to renditions in fabric of depictive art that would not look out of place on a framed canvas or in stained glass, like his South Cheyenne Canyon or Glen Eyrie Castle.

Among the new quilting terms and techniques I learned about at the museum was trapunto (also called "stuffed work"), a texture-enhancing technique that Tims puts to fine use in his Rhapsody in Green.