Transience of Identity

"Anonymous"
mixed media quilt and paint on canvas
30 x 36"

detail

detail

I have finished this piece using a vintage quilt and other collage elements on canvas.
I am pretty happy with it.  This is the kind of look and feel I was aiming for several weeks ago when I started deconstructing two different blue quilts.  It incorporates some pieces from both of the quilts along with a bit of imagery.

The title comes from the idea that the quilt I was repurposing was "anonymous"...I did not know who made it, how old it was, where is came from.  Then I started thinking about the woman who made it and that she also was anonymous, at least to me, because the work was not signed, as is true of many older quilts.

The concept that I am developing with these deconstructed quilts is concerned also with the transience of identity.  That a quilt in one form has one kind of identity.  If I change that by taking it apart, changing the arrangement, adding and deleting elements, painting it and use an unexpected surface for my collaging, then the object becomes something else.  It's identity becomes subject to all of the changes and rearrangements.  I hope it still has emotional content, but the way in which it might now comfort someone is different from the way the original soft quilt did.

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