Object number2019.24.4

Put Together

Date2014

Artist Mary Lee Bendolph (American, born 1935)

CultureAmerican

MediumSoft-ground etching with aquatint and spit-bite aquatint

EditionEdition 3 of 50

DimensionsPlate: 42 3/4 x 32 3/4 in. (108.6 x 83.2 cm)
Sheet: 52 x 40 3/4 in. (132.1 x 103.5 cm)

Credit LinePurchase, Betsy Mudge Wilson, class of 1956, Memorial Fund in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Africana Studies Program

On View

Not on view

Period21st c

Classification(s)

SignedOn recto, signed lower right margin in pencil: Mary Lee Bendolph

InscribedOn recto, by artist, lower right margin in pencil: 2014; lower center margin: Put together; lower left margin: 3/50

MarkingsOn recto, embossed with Paulson Fontaine's printer's chop in lower right margin corner

BibliographyInterwoven Histories: Prints by the Gee's Bend Quilting Collective, Frances Lehman Loeb Art Gallery, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY, September 9 2023 - January 28, 2024Provenancepurchased from Paulson Fontaine Press

Vassar Exhibitions

Interwoven Histories: Prints by the Gee’s Bend Quilt Collective

Label Text “We don’t try to style it or nothing. Folks call some of this kind of stuff “crazy quilts”—don’t know which-a-way it going. I never did go by a pattern. Didn’t none us.” Mary Lee Bendolph, matriarch quilt maker for the Gee’s Bend Quiltmaking Collective, often describes her practice and technique as intuitive. She took up quilting after observing her mother make them as a teenager in the 1950s. Traditionally, her quilts utilize salvaged fabric material to create rhythmic patterns and distinctive depictions of the world around her. Bendolph regularly collaborates with Paulson Fontaine Press to reproduce her quilt patterns in a new medium. Although translated from fabric to ink, the prints seemingly render the range of textiles such as the denim found on the corners of Put Together. The quilts go through a laborious layering process of etching and other traditional printmaking techniques that help fully capture the quiltmaker’s complex and intentional use of colors and textiles. Bendolph’s works are currently in the permanent collection of over 30 U.S. institutions and featured in a range of traveling group shows across the country.

DescriptionBlocked groups of multicolored triangular and rectangular strips arranged in a vertical rectangle surrounded by a dark maroon border with medium blue colored squares in the corners.

Terms

quilting

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email loebcollections@vassar.edu