THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 7, 1995 TAG: 9509060164
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 18 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY FRANK ROBERTS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
QUILTS TALK TO US.
They preserve memories and record history, art and culture.
This month, quilts are featured at Riddick's Folly in Suffolk and the Miles B. Carpenter Folk Art Museum in Wakefield, and quilting instruction is set at The Suffolk Museum.
Quilts often become family affairs.
``Their makers come alive in my mind and define my link in the genealogy chain. I know who I am,'' said Becky Brown of Richmond, one of 11 Old Dominion quiltmakers whose work will be featured in the Riddick's Folly exhibit, Sept. 21 to Oct. 24.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts exhibition, ``Pieces of Virginia,'' presents a full-sized quilt and 11 panels containing statements and photographs by the quiltmakers.
Eileen Mott, a Virginia Museum staff member, worked with quilting guilds across the state to select the 11 artists, calling their quilts ``imaginative, astonishingly intricate and colorful.''
One of the quiltmakers is Bonnie Lucy, a Virginia Beach native. The others represent locales west of Hampton Roads.
The 30 squares in the full-size pieced quilt were created by those women after each was provided with swatches of material. They worked in their favorite patchwork design.
The finished products were assembled into a whole quilt by the Richmond Quilters' Guild whose members contributed more than 400 hours.
The idea of the Riddick's Folly exhibit is to offer insight into Virginia's quiltmaking tradition.
Also on exhibit are pieces from the Tidewater Chapter of the Embroiderers Guild of America.
The quiltmakers represented at the Miles B. Carpenter Folk Art Museum, from Sept. 7 to Oct. 28, come from Washington, D.C., and from down the street.
Fay Fuller Hoodock, who lives in the capital and works for the Defense Department, started making quilts in the early 1980s, doing it the old-fashioned way - by hand, on lap, no frame.
She is exhibiting ``Blue Horizontal,'' ``Morgan's Autumn'' and ``Spring Dance'' - items she made while watching the Washington Redskins, Baltimore Orioles and ACC basketball on television.
Her ``Blue Devil'' quilt was finished the night Duke won the NCAA Tournament.
Although living in D.C. she is descended from the Butts, Hunt, Clements and Parker families of Southampton and Surry counties.
Janie Mattox Ashby, a graduate of Waverly High School and a member of Waverly Baptist Church, is a former piano and voice teacher who decided that quilting is good therapy.
Her ``Sun Bonnet Girl'' is of particular interest locally. Started in 1969, it features scraps of material from each of her daughters' ``first day of school'' dresses, plus the names of their schoolteachers. In 1977, a sample from Kathy Ashby's wedding gown was added.
Another family property on display is a quilt made in Accomac around 1890 and featuring Eastern Shore animals, plants and birds, plus the names of the Ashby family.
On Sept. 27, Riddick's Folly is offering a free video, ``Patchwork Quilt,'' the story of a little girl who learns the secret ingredient in her grandmother's special quilt of memories.
Another free film is scheduled for Oct. 15. ``Hearts and Hands: A Social History of 19th Century Women and Quilts,'' is about quilts that tell the story of industrialization, abolition, women's rights, the Civil War and more.
If you want to learn the art of quilting, the Suffolk Museum is offering a ``Beginning Quilting Class'' from 10 a.m. to noon Thursdays from Sept. 14 to Oct. 12.
Students can learn traditional quilting methods while working with quilting squares and practicing the technique of hand-piercing. MEMO: For more information, call Riddick's Folly at 934-1390, Miles B.
Carpenter Folk Art Museum at 834-2151 or 834-2969 and the Suffolk Museum
at 925-6311.
ILLUSTRATION: Ella Opheim's three-pieced quilt design is on display at the
``Pieces of Virginia'' exhibit at Riddick's Folly.
by CNB