(1).png){kind=small}
.png){kind=small}
.png){kind=small}
International Quilt Festival 2013, Houston, #7: Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry
Caryl Bryer Fallert Gentry makes the leap into a new life
One of the stand-out exhibits of last Fall’s Houston International Quilt Festival 2013 was Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry’s exhibit of 30 for 30: to celebrate 30 years of art quilts, she made 30 quilts 30×30 inches. They celebrate her journey, invoking her style and techniques that have made her one of the pre-eminent art quilters of our day. You can visit her website, here.
Many of you will know her for her vibrant rainbow-hued hand-dyes and appli-pieced quilts. Some of you will remember the various styles she has tried over the years–remember the wonderful dandelion quilts? the photo transfers? the tucks and pleats? All are represented in this exhibit.
Some of you may know that she realized a dream, building a home and studio in Paducah with her husband after she retired from her “day job” with United (I think it was) airlines. Her Paducah studio is amazing (here’s a link to an online tour of her studio), a perfect place to live and to offer workshops and sell her works and fabrics. Then her husband died suddenly what seems like just a few years ago, but was actually a few more than that. After several years alone, she met Ron Gentry, love happened, and they married at the Quilt Museum in Paducah, with homes in Paducah and his home base of Port Townsend. The quilt above is Caryl making the leap to this new life! And I’ll put in a plug for her…the studio is now for sale! Check here.
The exhibit was just inside the main doors as you enter the convention center on the quilt show side (as opposed to the vendor side) of Festival…what a wonderful way to begin! Every time I passed by there were people taking photos and enjoying her work.
Remember the gradations of value, light, the piecing? Notice how perfectly centered the binding is, the yellow precisely in the middle, the mono-rpinted border, the quilting. Sigh.
The nearly cellular-level “macro” shots?
The photo transfer/prints years? What is wonderful is that this is a new quilt, using photos from the Pacific Northwest and her new life, but in the style of these particular years.
A symphony of color. SWOON!
Be still my beating heart! The lighting was great when you were standing there looking at the quilt, but my photos are a bit washed out–the color was more vibrant.
And a detail:
Look at that quilting. And of course the quilts are perfectly flat, perfectly square, perfectly perfect.
The best news is that you can see all the quilts here (and see how many are sold/reserved and which are still available).
And yet more color and movement and “Macro”. Sigh. Swoon.
Though I didn’t buy the CD, a CD with proffesional photographs of this series and exhibit in its entirety is available. Hope you’ve enjoyed this snapshot as much as I enjoyed seeing the quilts. Thank you, Caryl, for sharing your art and life with us.
March 3rd, 2014 at 10:41 am
Sarah Ann, huge thanks for profiling Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry. I did not know her work and absolutely love love this.
March 22nd, 2014 at 2:47 pm
I saw this exhibit in Houston and my absolute favorite is the last photo. To see them as a body of work in person was so inspiring ( and humbling!)