Album Quilt
Sarah Ann Wilson (New York or New Jersey, United States)
1854
- Medium
- Appliquéd, pieced and embroidered quilt; dyed, undyed and printed cotton plain weave fabrics and cotton and silk velvet fabric; cotton embroidery threads
- Classification
- Textile
- Dimensions
- 217.1 × 255.8 cm (85 1/2 × 100 3/4 in.)
- Culture
- New York
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Textiles
- Credit line
- Purchased with funds provided by Mrs. David W. Grainger
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
Made before the Civil War, as indicated by the date inscribed in a square in the bottom row, this quilt depicts African American figures who seem to be a family. The figures are sensitively portrayed, with appliquéd and embroidered brown fabric comprising their faces and hands. The familial narrative is reinforced by the hand-and-heart motif in the bottom right corner. The specificity of the portrayal and the similarity of the figures to those in another quilt (depicted here) suggest that these figures may represent the maker's own family. Although historians know little about Wilson, she may have been a free black woman living in New York.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
