Artist: Elizabeth Bishop Wheatley
Title: Spectrum
Media: Original Mixed media quilted paper & threadQuilt Block Pattern: Postage Stamp
Size: 80" x 80" (plus width for self-supporting stand)
 
Artist Statement:Light hits a prism, each color of the rainbow refracting outwards.
Cutting through the darkness, escaping the boundary.
Exposing the colors
that were there all along,
hidden from view.
 
This spectrum of light, all colors and hues.
Each with its place, each belonging.
Each essential to the rest.
 
Let there be light.
Now visible, now knowable, now whole.*
 
Paper Quilt Series: Pieced Back Together *My series of mixed media paper quilts feature gathered papers and ephemera quilted together. The use of historical quilt patterns echoes the craft of women’s work, generational relationships, and the collective nature of the quilt circle.I associate quilts with maternal comfort, female community, traditions + patterns, economy of resources, the mosaic nature of memory, utility, form + function, healing warmth, and creating something beautifully intricate from scraps and discards.
 
These paper quilts feature a variety of materials: newspaper clippings, my children’s artwork, block prints, scripture, cyanotype, maps, photographs, and literal blood, sweat, and tears. They are then assembled and sewn individually on a vintage sewing machine.
 
Quilts have a long history of engaging with social and political landscapes, while simultaneously being a protective covering and a symbol of the safety of home. I hope you find new comfort in some facet of yourself reflected back at you, and dwell in a mosaic of wholeness.