Design Concept

In late December 2022, we visited MONA, the Museum of Old and New Art, in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. It was a truly weird and wonderful experience. Describing it is too much to include in an artist’s statement, but you can read all about it at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Old_and_New_Art.

MONA is built, three stories down, into sandstone cliffs. On the top level I took a photograph looking down three levels. I was fascinated by the patterns of cracks in the sandstone and the kerf marks made by the cutting tools used to shape it. My quilt began with part of a photograph I took of the wall. I played with the photo, adding contrast, saturation and digital painting as well as changing the orientation. The altered image was printed on cotton fabric by Spoonflower. In the quilting I used many different colors of polyester and acrylic thread. I began by following some of the kerf marks with my stitching, but soon began treating the image as simply an abstract design. I built up layers of stitching going in different directions, creating a complex surface texture. The quilt is finished with a solid black binding. The backing is a fabric from my Caryl’s Feather collection for Benartex.

Exhibitions:

• Photos, Pixels, & Pizzazz: Recent Quilts by Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry, Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum, Golden CO, 7/22 – 10/19, 2024
• A Life in Color: 50-year Retrospective Solo Exhibition, National Quilt Museum, Paducah, KY, March 14-October 7, 2025

Publications

• Quiltfolk, issue 32, p. 26 (feature article)