Themes spanning music, Black history, social justice, enslavement and empowerment are stitched into more than 150 works on display during the 18th annual Atlanta Quilt Festival.
The festival opened July 31 at the Southwest Arts Center and continues through Sept. 5. More than 150 quilts highlight African American history and culture. Quilters from Atlanta and across the U.S. are participating in the festival, which features five juried categories: African American Heritage, traditional, modern, art, and small quilts.
This year’s featured non-juried exhibit, Music Moves Movements, includes 50 original quilts exploring the role music has played in political movements and social change throughout history. About half are displayed in the Southwest Arts Center Gallery, and the remainder are exhibited at the Evelyn G. Lowery Cascade Library.
Visitors to the Atlanta Quilt Festival can also listen to a soundtrack connected to the works as they move through the exhibit.
Some of the songs that inspired multiple interpretations of Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam” and Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On.” Other works draw from music associated with protest, freedom and empowerment across generations.
Atlanta Quilt Festival CEO O.V. Brantley titled her quilt, “From Mockery to Majesty,” inspired by the song “Yankee Doodle.” Americans embraced the song that the British originally used to ridicule them, she said.
Brantley, who grew up in segregated Crossett, Arkansas, added, “And for me growing up in the South around people who try to make you feel less than you are, the trick is to prove them wrong.”
The festival began 18 years ago as a small show among family and friends at the former Southwest Arts Center on Butler Road, Brantley said, and has since grown into a nonprofit event drawing quilters from around the country.
Featured gallery exhibits have increasingly incorporated social justice themes. Last year’s exhibit, “Banned Books: Freedom to Read What I Want,” explored censorship, while quilts inspired by the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis were featured for three years and eventually collected in a book.
Along with the exhibition, the festival offers quilting classes, workshops and lectures on Fridays and Saturdays. On August 15, master quilter Jeanette Walton will present a trunk show of her work.
First-place winners in this year’s juried competition include Carolyn White in the African American Heritage Quilt category for “Call Me Alkebulan-Mother of Mankind-Africa from A to Z;” Jacquelyn Simpson in the Art Quilt category for “Hexy Lady;” and Betsy Kulamer in the Modern Quilt category for “Kaleidoscope 2.”
Melinda Rushing earned two first-place awards, winning the Small Quilt category for “The Warmth We Inherit” and the Traditional Quilt category for “Otomi Fiesta Full.”
The Music Moves Movements collection is also designed to travel. In March, it is scheduled to be exhibited at the Southern Poverty Law Center’s museum.
