Join us for a free virtual program with guest speakers Valerie Davis from Milwaukee Public Museum and Rose Gallenberger from Wauwatosa Historical Society for a discussion of quilts in the exhibition and book, Wisconsin Quilts: Stories in the Stitches. Also enjoy the second part of the virtual tour of WMQFA’s current exhibit, Wisconsin Quilts: Stories in the Stitches, before the exhibition closes Sunday, August 29.
Click here to join the FREE Zoom program: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83544936020
This program is free, but donations are appreciated! Click here to donate.
About the Exhibition
Wisconsin Quilts: Stories in the Stitches celebrates WMQFA's 10th anniversary. Twenty years ago, a group of women researchers wrote the seminal book Stories in the Stitches based on their documentation of quilts in Wisconsin. The women began this longstanding project, called the Wisconsin Quilt History Project, in the 1980s and still continue it today.
WMQFA's history is intimately entwined with the Wisconsin Quilt History Project. Many of the quilt documenters became the museum's founding mothers. On the 20th anniversary of the book and the 10th anniversary of WMQFA, this exhibition brings together thirty quilts illustrated in Stories in the Stitches, exhibited here for the first time.
The quilts reproduced in the book represent detailed personal histories and incredible stories surrounding the quilts, including narratives of women's lives during the Civil War and the Great Depression, personal triumphs and tragedies, connections to the 1933 World's Fair, and quilts from the Works Progress Administration, among many others.
The result of deep research into the whereabouts of the quilts, many of which are still with the makers' descendants, this exhibition tells the rich history of quilt making in Wisconsin.
This exhibition is made possible by the generous support of the American Quilt Study Group and Hilgendorf Memorials: Rock of Ages. Programming at WMQFA is supported by grants from the Wisconsin Arts Board, National Endowment for the Arts, and the Kohler Foundation Inc.