When my friend Rachel approached me about making a custom quilt for her brother, Adam, his wife Christin, and their new baby, I knew it would be a fun project. Rachel loves textiles and also expressed early on that she would be thrilled to give me as much artistic freedom as I wanted when it came to choosing a design and palette. Then she texted me that her brother, who did his graduate research on the Zapatista movement in Oventik, had some textiles he brought home from that travel. Could I incorporate them into the quilt? Of course. I was thrilled.
We chose to use nine hand-embroidered Zapatista pieces. Two were from scarves, two were stitched on the top of tortilla warmers, and five were standalone pieces. After staring at them for quite awhile, I finally decided that each piece should be “framed” with red fabric in order to let the handwork shine. I collected images of sampler quilts and found myself drawn again and again to the quilts that employed improv and “liberated quilting” techniques. I also connected with the quilts that unapologetically used color, and lots of it. Here’s a link to our Pinterest inspiration board if you want to see more of what inspired my choices.
Most quilters I know will tell you that there are moments in every project where you wonder, Is this going to work? Will it all come together? This happens to me every time, without fail. It certainly happened a few times when I was making this quilt. I felt so honored to be working with handmade Zapatista art and so determined to do right by the women who created these pieces that I felt pressure and even some nerves. Honestly though, that kind of feeling is what motivates me as a maker. And luckily, I believe it did come together in the end.
And speaking of the end: the quilting. I did not want to quilt over the original embroidery at all so I chose instead to densely, free-motion quilt the entire background and border. This makes the back of the quilt a bit messy in my experience but I love the effect it has on the look and feel of the quilt top. The embroidered pieces popped even more.
It was incredible to work in my studio for the past two months while this quilt came together. It’s never been brighter or more colorful in there, and anyone who knows my work knows I love color.
Only one piece of embroidery was signed by its creator; the dragon piece which was made by Catarina. I am so grateful to her and the other artisans who filled my home with their color, and their messages of justice and hope. Together their work is star of this quilt, and deserves the most credit for how this piece looks and feels. Thank you too to Adam and Christin for trusting me to create something using these precious pieces.
Adam was generous enough to share photos of Oventik with me for this blog post (see slideshow below). He also shared a bit about the embroidered pieces and where they were made: “They all come from the Zapatista village called Oventik, which is closed to outsiders unless you get permission to enter from the council and get a guided tour. They also open to the public a couple times a year for festivals. The town is called a ‘caracol’ or snail shell, the spiral representing a non hierarchical government.”
Finally, I want to say thanks to my friend Rachel for commissioning this piece and trusting me to create something for her family. Here are a few more looks at the quilt details and process.
