A Statement in Colors

Article by Christine Diaz

A new day is dawning in Concord quilting. This autumn, The Umbrella Community Arts Center's Arts Education program introduced a class focused on the application and impact of color on quilt design. Students had an opportunity to work with instructor Tica de Moor in an eight-week course on color theory and quilt design fundamentals, and gain hands-on practice with color choice, color interaction, and layout.

One might think of quilts as traditional bedding crafted by early American women, or passed down through generations from our grandmothers, but modern-day quilting has evolved from this utility craft into an exquisite art form all its own. While contemporary quilting can still be traditional, in today’s busy world quilters often turn to abstract, freeform designs, which has the potential to be simpler and faster to produce. Quilters can achieve their aesthetic in fresh, innovative ways, whether they are quilting for fun and practice, for bedding, or wall art.

Tica is passionate about sharing her love of color and quilting with her students. Growing up in South Africa as a daughter of a textile importer, she fell in love with fabrics, sewing and design early on. Spending her formative years in a country with vast natural beauty and poverty, Tica was moved by African women’s bright color choices. Though surrounded by impoverished conditions, women in communities across the continent, Tica observes, wear vibrantly colored clothing. This echoes the African sense of design: bold, strong, and with an element of surprise.

MEANING IN COLORS

In her class, students learn that color choice is about much more than creating aesthetic impact ―thoughtfully chosen colors can be about creating light, dimension, emotional impression and symbolic meaning.

“All colors are beautiful and can work in a quilt, depending on the context,” Tica says, “and many colors have an underlying meaning can give a quilt additional depth.”

In class, she guides her students to think about the message, idea, or the mood they want their quilt to convey. An example of this approach comes from a traditional quilt she designed to pay homage to the quilters of the Civil War era. Tica deliberately selected a color palette with historical resonance instead of choosing the typical colors of the time― dark green, burgundy, or beige. She used mauve, which was a newly discovered aniline dye popular for womens’ formal clothing and the color of mourning; rust, which spoke of boots on the ground and was the color of everyday wear for women during the Civil War years (it didn’t show the dirt!); and gray, a masculine color used for soldiers’ uniforms.

MAKING A STATEMENT

As with Tica’s Civil War design, a quilt colored mindfully becomes a multidimensional work of art, connecting in a more meaningful way to all who view it. Quilters can make a statement with color choices, whether about themselves, a social issue of the day, or about the world at large.

While Tica cautions that fabric can be a challenging medium, she encourages her students to broaden their color horizons. With contemporary quilting’s fluid, relaxed and spontaneous approach, those experimenting with color can achieve an attractive and sophisticated design. The color-minded quilter can have fun building their quilt piece by piece, observing how their color, fabric, and design choices come together to help tell a story and to create a unique work of art.

FIBER ARTS TO THE FORE

Quilting and fiber arts in general are taking an increasingly prominent role at The Umbrella. Courses like Tica de Moor's are highly popular among adult learners (Winter session classes are enrolling now and start Jan. 5), while the newly renovated Visual Arts Gallery at 40 Stow Street will host a major curated fiber arts exhibition, themed "Migration," from Jan. 10 – Feb. 28.

MORE INFORMATION

For information on fiber arts classes and exhibitions, the public can call 978-371-0820, visit TheUmbrellaArts.org/education, contact info@theumbrellaarts.org.

Photos: Tica de Moor by Nick Warchol (top); all others courtesy Tica de Moor