GUEST SPEAKER:
Glendora Simmonson
Nubian Quilters Guild
Exerts from
Glendora Simmonson
Nubian Quilters Guild
Exerts from
SIGNS & SYMBOLS:
African Images in
African American Quilts
African Images in
African American Quilts
by Maude Southwell Wahlman
Our study of symbols that impact African American traditions took a somewhat bumpy turn last week as we concluded watched "Ethnic Notions." On a more positive cultural note, the above publication is the result of years of research study and travel to rural communities in the South, to begin to analysis the relationship between African symbols and their American counter parts in African American quilts...
In this book Maude Southwell Wahlman, talks about an exhibit she curated along with John Scully at the Yale School of Art Gallery in January 1980. At that time they noticed seven traits that seemed to distinguish African American quilts from the Anglo-American traditions. Even though these African American quilts communities worked in isolation of from other each other. They found a distinct emphasis on the following design elements:
1. vertical strips
2. bright colors
3. large designs
4. asymmetry
5. improvisation
6. multiple patterning
7. symbolic forms
This aesthetic criteria was just a starting point for beginning to understand how African textiles influenced early generations of African American quilters, and continue to influence mostly Southern communities as well. Wahlman determined that "many guilt-top designs were similar to designs found in African religious textiles, designs that can be decoded because contemporary Africans know what the symbolic designs mean."
"...The antecedents of contemporary African textiles and African American quilts were developed in Africa as far back as two thousand years ago, when cotton was domesticated along the Niger River in Mali, and used for fishnets and woven cloth. The actual links between African and African American textile traditions [however], can be traced to the years between 1650 and 1850." Which coincides with the height of slave trade in the Americas.
"Although men had traditionally been the primary textile artists in Africa, American plantation owners adhered to the European system of labor division. Thus African women became the principal weavers, seamstresses, and quilters in southern society. African women produced utilitarian and decorative quilts for both black and white households. Many of their quilts were done in the traditional Anglo-American styles. However, those quilts made for personal, offer utilitarian, uses by African Americans were designed and stitched with African traditions in mind."
For the purposes of the paper quilt we will construct in class we will be borrowing from the following criteria:
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| Strip quilt by Catherine Somerville Alabama 1940 |
- STRIPS: which are chief construction techniques and a dominant design symbol in West Africa, the Caribbean and African American textiles. This is a form of patchwork, that occur in African textile history among the Fante Asafo flags, Asante cloth from Ghana, Egungun costumes of the Yoruba people of Nigeria and the Kuiba people of the Cameroon, and the Pygmies of Central Africa. In the printed textiles of the Dioula people of Senegal, and Sierra Leone. A tradition of strips also continued in the new world in Southern part of North America, Brazil and Suriname, in South America, and in Haiti via a striped cloth called Mayo, worn to protect one against evil spirits.
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Bible Textile by Harriet Powers, Athens, Georgia, c 1896 |
- APPLIQUÉD: Besides piecing, in which strip patterns dominated, another basic quilt technique known in Europe, Africa, and America is the appliqué, the art of sewing cut-out shapes onto a surface. African cultures used this technique to record histories, religious values, and the personal histories of famous individuals. Popular designs would symbolize power, skill, leadership, wisdom, courage, balance, composure, and other personal or religious qualities. The best known African appliquéd cloth was made by the Fon people of the Republic of Benin (formerly Dahomey). The most noted example of African American appliquéd was created Harriet Powers.
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- RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS: An analysis of African American folk art suggests a cultural strategy of sorting African heritages into luxuries as essential intellectual tools to comprehend the new world... Writing and healing charms are two significant religious concepts that had profound influence on traditional African American folk art. Adinkra symbols fall into this category. Adinkra symbols are used by the Asante people of Ghana to make Adinkra cloth; Nsibidi script is used by the Igbo people of Nigeria to create Ukara cloth. Other symbols include Vai Syllabary, cosmograms, and ground paintings. The African American quilt descendant of these symbols is the "Album Quilt." Exemplifying the African American principle of protective multiple patterning, because evil spirits would have to decode the complex mixture of patterns before they could do any harm.
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MEN QUILT, by Sarah Mary Taylor, Yazoo City MS, 1979 |
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| Faith Ringgold, The Dinner Quilt, 1986 |
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| Appliqué cloth Republic of Benin; Fon peoples Late 20th century |
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
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| Ndebele Woman sitting in front of her wall painting |
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| Symbols of South-East Africa |
Above is part of a work by Los Angeles-based artist Alison Saar. Her sculptures and installations explore themes of race, gender, and identity. Her art is a personal form of visual narrative that demonstrates an appreciation of a rich diversity of materials, techniques, and cultural aesthetics around her. The above image is part of Saar’s work called "York: Terra Incognita," a tribute to the memory of William Clark’s slave York. This work is an important visual narrative because it helps to tell a story that was never properly documented prior to the commission of this sculpture. 
