Quilters Stitched Together Their Favorite

Myths, Legends And Fairy Tales

For Library Exhibition

By Shannon Hicks

For this year’s exhibition at Booth Library, the members of Scrapbag Quilt Artists are presenting “Myths, Legends & Fairy Tales.” The ten artisans with work in the show have been working on their quilts since last fall or early winter, when the club decided on the theme for this year’s show, said Barbara Drillick, who was one of those assembling the presentation at the library last week.

“We decided on the theme, and went to work,” Ms Drillick said. As she made final adjustments Friday morning to the quilt by fellow club member Anita Vecchia, she mentioned that everyone worked independently.

“We didn’t check ahead to see what which book or story everyone was working on, no,” she said. “We came up with the theme and figured we would wait to see the results.”

For visitors to Newtown’s public library, the resulting collection is something that can be viewed and admired by many different ages. Kids can have fun recognizing some of their favorite stories (among them Thumbelina, Jack and The Beanstalk, Little Red Riding Hood and even the setting of a hobbit house based on a drawing by The Hobbit creator J.R.R. Tolkien). Adults can have fun thinking back to some of their childhood stories, and quilt enthusiasts will be thrilled at the level of experience that was needed to create these works of art.

Among the highlights of this year’s show is Alice Garrard’s quilt, “Back To My Golden Book,” which incorporates a photo of the West Redding resident as she “joins” Brush and Hush for a reading of childhood favorite The Color Kittens; and “Jack’s Journey” by Nike Cutsumpas of Danbury, which uses real beans at the base of the quilted beanstalk.

Also represented in the collection are Carolyn Cooney of Danbury (with two quilts, “Into The Woods” and “Little Red Riding Hood”), Lynne Croswell of Ludlow, Vt. (“The Selfish Giant”), Barbara Drillick of Brookfield (“The Bremen Musicians”), Janet Bunch of Woodbury (“The Leafy Sea Dragon,” in which she created her own “real-life dragon,” she says in her notes, The Dragon Fish of coastal Australia), Norma Schlager of Danbury (also with two quilts, “Thumbelina” and “Xiao Sheng and the Magic Pearl”) and Anita Vecchia of Gilbert, Ariz. (“Welcome To Bog End”).

The group presented one of its first exhibits at Booth Library in 1999. It did not put up a show the following year, but was back in 2001 and has had annual shows at the library since then.

Previous exhibits have also included “Quilts in Motion,” where 12 members created 20 quilts in response to the challenge to create the illusion of motion in a two-dimensional quilt; “Into The Garden,” a collection of 22 art quilts representing the efforts of 12 members, displayed March 2002; and “Elements of Architecture,” March 2001; and in 1999, “Imagining Emily,” quilted wall hangings inspired by the poetry of Emily Dickinson.

The group formed in 1985 in Newtown from a Newcomers Club, and now includes members from Fairfield and Litchfield counties and beyond. Meeting weekly, members share inspiration, assist with technical challenges, and support each other creatively and in their personal lives.

From their beginnings in traditional quiltmaking, the group reflects the changes in the textile arts over the past two decades. Improvements in equipment, fabric, thread, and the increasing inclusion of embellishment and other surface design techniques produce a modern art form that is definitely not your grandmother’s flower garden.

Several of the members have exhibited nationally, most are prizewinners in various venues, many are renowned teachers in the fiber arts, and one has gone on to open her own gallery in Brandon, Vt.