After a friend sent me a postcard of "The Letter" by Mary Cassatt, I became obsessed. The colors resonated with me, and the whole composition felt pleasing. As I studied it more I became aware of the pattern on the woman's dress, which to me read as a curious shape, neither flower nor fish, although it looked more fish than flower to me. I began to draw my versions of the pattern, and eventually cut a stencil for the first of two quilts that I have been working on simultaneously. This is the first. After reading a few notes online about the print I became aware that we don't know who the letter is for. We don't know who this woman is. We don't know what is in the letter. A complete mystery, a private conversation. Personal. The quilt became its title. Or the title became the quilt.
Interior Monologue
28"w x 49"h (71 cm x 124.5 cm)
Hand drawn and cut stencil with metallic gold fabric paint on found fabric; letterpress on black Kona cotton; beaded
Details:
The stencil pattern started to look like letters. The red beads started to look like red blood cells to me. The black bead zigzags, a reminder of an electrocardiogram. But that was my interior monologue. They don't have to be those things at all.
We went to see "The Letter" in person at the
Legion of Honor in San Francisco, part of the
Mary Cassatt at Work exhibition, on view there until January 26, 2025.
Journal page from November 29, 2024. Quilts were not on hold, but were on slow during November as I participated again in National Novel Writing Month.
Note: If there is any tool I would recommend it would be a lint roller! I ran one over this quilt four times and still it picked up fibers. They are verrrry inexpensive and made up of a very basic roll of sticky tape on a handle.
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