Oprah and Jackie O. Lend Their Faces to This Optical Illusion Quilt

The International Quilt Invitational takes the art of quilting three exits past 'grandmotherly.'

by Diana Shi

June 25, 2016, 11:55am

Frame of Mind, Flora Joy, Tennessee. All images courtesy Utah Museums Association

A multidimensional quilt alternates from the winning smile of Jackie O., to the gleaming face of Oprah, to the bemused look of Mother Teresa—all relative to the viewer’s position.

A visual interst piece as much as it is a labor of love, this particular quilt is a featured selection at this year’s International Quilt Invitational in Brigham City, Utah, which welcomes 80 original works of quilt art to the festival. Tennessean Floray Joy shares the inspiration for her illusion-esque quilt in the press release, stating “I was waiting in my car for a traffic light to change [when] a revolving billboard caught my eye. Three different images, one at a time, appeared every 10 seconds.” She continues to explain that the process for weaving the three iconic figures into one final quilt took many years to realize.

Let’s All Spring Forward, Rosalie Baker, Iowa

Sandstorm Over the White Desert, Jenny Bowker, Australia

The art of quilting is often muddled by a tropes of the grandmotherly persuasion, alongside knitting and needle-poin, but for Australian quilter, Gloria Loughman a featured artist at this year's Invitational, it's something else entirely. Loughman is a teacher who found solace in patchwork and quilting after recuperating from chemotherapy. Her works depict brilliant landscape tableaus, enhanced by detailed embroidery and rounds of hand-dyeing.

Machu Picchu, Barbara Barrick McKie, Connecticut

Moreover, the International Quilt Invitational is curated to global tastes, featuring a collection of quilts that bring to mind a tally of attractions inside a traveler’s guidebook. Each piece is described as a “living history,” with quilts depicting “18th-century, pedestrian, Jade Belt Bridge in China; the landmarks of Berlin, the capital of Germany; postcards from Jerusalem that convey the peace that still seeps from its stones despite years of turmoil; New York’s 1835 Ogdensburg Harbor Lighthouse at the mouth of the Oswegatchie and St. Lawrence rivers; and Magdy Badrmany, a warm, generous, Bedouin guide for a quilter in Egypt’s White Desert."