SONG QUILTS: A CELEBRATION OF STITCH AND SONG

The Song Quilts project visually interprets folk music from the American South and the Russian Arctic. I have traveled across the US and Northwest Russia interviewing women and gathering their songs. From these field recordings, I create transcriptions of the folksongs and transform them into quilts. I developed a notation method that translates pitch into color and rhythm into shape. The quilt notations are direct transcriptions as they were sung to me by the women who participated. The result is a synesthetic meditation on the power of women's voices and folk traditions across diverse peoples. Each Song Quilt celebrates the contributions of “women’s work” to national identity, global culture, and shared traditions.

-click through pictures to full quilt profiles-

Katyusha

SUNG by Virginia Bartow - Hope, NJ 1982

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2018

Cowboy Jack

sung by Marcella Woerman - Oakland, Nebraska 2016

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2016

A Little Stream of Honey

Sung by Vernyce Dannells - PhiladElphia 2018

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2018

SVECHA

Sung by Nadezhda Mironova - Moscow, Russia 2019

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2019

Steal Away to Jesus

Sung by Mary Ann Pettway, Gees bend, Alabama 2018

Designed Pieced and quilted by EHJ 2019

Vdol Po Travke

Sung BY Tatiana Khvastunova, Tatiana Panova, Ekaterina Kharlanova, Tatiana Golvskaya - Arkhangelsk, russia 2017

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2017

Aunt Dinah's Quilting Party

sung by Carol Phillips - Mineral, Virginia 2017.

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2017

Ne Bela Zarya

sung by Oksana dobrinsykaya - ArkhangelSk, russia 2017

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2018

Goryun Molodoy

sung by Anna akimova - arkhangelsk, russia 2018

Designed, pieced, and quilted by ehj 2019

Bury Me Beneath the Willow

sung by alex caton - Gordonsville, virginia 2017

Designed, pieced, and quilted by EHJ 2017

This project would not have been possible without the help of Ekaterina Sharova of the Arctic Art Institute, and a grant from the PUFFIN FOUNDATION