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Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Karen Musgrave
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Susan Nash
OHMS Object
https://quiltalliance.net/ohms-viewer-master/viewer.php?cachefile=OH43068-005.xml
OHMS Object Text
Raw full-text of the OHMS Object. Used for full-text searching.
5.4 Interview with Susan Nash OH43068-005 Quilters' S.O.S. -- Save Our Stories The Sacred Threads QSOS Quilt Alliance Susan Nash Karen Musgrave 0 https://quiltalliance.net/qsos-audio/OH43068-005 Nash.mp3 Other audio Oral History Karen Musgrave (KM): This is Karen Musgrave and I' ; m conducting a Quilters' ; S.O.S. - Save Our Stories interview with Susan Nash. Susan is in Zanesville, Ohio and I' ; m in Naperville, Illinois so we are conducting this interview over the telephone. Today' ; s date is April 13, 2009 [April 6, 2009.]. It is now 9:14 a.m. Susan, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to do this interview with me. Please tell me about your quilt " ; Token of Love." ; Susan Nash (SN): My quilt " ; Token of Love" ; was truly made, as a work of heart beyond being a work of art. I made it in honor of my mother who passed away in 2000. I used to teach a quilting class in Newark, Ohio, at a shop that is now closed, but people wanted to learn Crazy quilting techniques. I was trying to incorporate newer techniques beyond just the Crazy Quilt techniques, which I admire and love, but I was including and teaching in the class how to do transfers onto fabric. Taking their old photographs and doing that sort of thing using the computer. I started out by just making blocks memorializing my mother and it just grew into this larger piece. I had a picture of her at six month old, at her high school, and then later in her life, and it was a fun way to teach a lot of different techniques. My favorite thing to do, I call it " ; junking up quilts." ; It is adding all kinds of found objects that I collect and enjoy using. One of my favorite objects on this quilt is I guess you would call it a garter, the bottom of a garter off of a girdle and one of my memories with my mother is that she used to go to bridge club meetings once a month and that was a big deal because she was a stay at home mom and it was important for her to get out once in a while and she was a large woman and could not reach around and hook up her hose to her garter and it was my job. I' ; ve got one of those on the quilt. It was just in honor of my mom. When I look back, she was my biggest cheerleader. She was always encouraging me and there wasn' ; t anything I couldn' ; t do. I' ; m just really pleased to have been able to make this and share it with other people. I was honored that it was actually accepted into the Sacred Threads in 2007. I don' ; t even remember which Sacred Threads has the different options that you can enter a quilt under joy, inspiration, spirituality, healing, grief, peace and I' ; m not sure which one it went under. It could have been under--I' ; m assuming it did " ; Inspiration." ; It could have been " ; Joy." ; Could have been any of those. It helped me grieve the loss and I enjoy looking at it every day. It hangs in my studio and reminds me of her inspiration. KM: Did you actually go to Sacred Threads to see it? SN: Yes, I' ; m fortunate enough to live just 45 minutes away from Reynoldsburg, Ohio. So, yes. KM: Tell me about the experience. SN: Sacred Threads is just an amazing show. I like it because each quilt hanging in the show has a description, the maker has described what they were thinking, why they made this quilt and so many times you look around and you see people having to leave because they are in tears to go and collect themselves because the stories, some of them are so deep and so touching. It is just a wonderful, wonderful venue. KM: Tell me about the experience of writing your Artist Statement. SN: That one was a particularly easy Artist Statement for me to write as I recall, that was two years ago, just because it was something so near to my heart. It was just very easy for me to expound on the fact that Mother was a promoter of mine. She just made me feel safe and secure and that I was an amazing person and I really miss her and I' ; ve found through time that I just always assumed everybody loves the mother and would miss them and it shocks me when I say to someone that they are so lucky to still have their mother, and they don' ; t feel that way. For the majority, I think people do. KM: Is this quilt typical of your style? SN: It' ; s not. I did a series of quilts like that and I do love. I love and admire older quilts and traditional quilts. This one is probably more traditional than what I do more recently. Even though it' ; s in a traditional style, it is not particularly a traditional Crazy Quilt. I would say it' ; s got a lot more, a whole different shape, a lot more things added to it like the old gloves and ink jet transfers, that sort of thing. I' ; m doing more nature oriented pieces now. I' ; m doing a ginkgo series using ginkgo leaves, but I do love to add things to my pieces. So this is indicative of that. " ; Token of Love" ; definitely reflects that. KM: There is a lot of embellishment on this quilt. SN: It is my favorite thing to do. I have an older friend that at lunch she suggested that you should be done, I was still putting things on a piece and she [laughs.] is amazed at how much stuff I still had yet to put on. Sometimes it is hard to know when you are finished. You just decide I guess or maybe things are never finished. I still find myself adding here and there the different pieces. KM: Tell me about your interest in quiltmaking. SN: It goes back a long ways. I grew up in a family where my grandmother and aunts on my father' ; s side made quilts constantly and we slept under quilts, I was surrounded by quilts growing up and I' ; ve always appreciated them. I wasn' ; t really, didn' ; t enjoy sewing that much until I got into high school and figured out I could have more clothes if I sewed them myself. From that, I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Zoology from Ohio University, but I' ; ve never used it. I quickly went back to sewing and art, would have been my first love, but my father thought I should get a degree in something I could actually make money in, which kind of backfired [laughs.] because I' ; m fortunate enough in this day to have a studio and be working outside the home in my own studio and be a full time studio artist and have a husband who is willing to help finance me that way. KM: You mentioned teaching, do you still teach? SN: I haven' ; t been recently. I open to it. I' ; ve been invited by the local quilt group to teach here and there. I enjoyed it when I was working at the quilt shop it was fun, I really enjoy teaching people new techniques and watching them get excited about. KM: Since you mentioned your studio, describe your studio. SN: It is a wonderful space. It is an old warehouse dating back to, the title search was back to 1878 but that' ; s not as old as the building is. It has great old bones. It is just brick and wood and a big long open space. Windows are seven feet above our head so we actually have a loft at one end so we can look out the windows. I share it with another artist. She is a mixed media artist. We had shared a studio since I want to say 2004 in downtown Zanesville. We were fortunate at the time that we decided to have a studio outside of our home, Zanesville also decided to have an artist colony in downtown so we were fortunate to become members of that and they have sponsors for Friday Art Walks each month so we are open during the day, but we are also open every first Friday and after how many years it is starting to pick up. People are starting to realize that there are artists in downtown Zanesville, and it is exciting, very exciting. This is the place I love to be in, I have no problems spending my time here making art. KM: What does it look like besides that, what do you have there? SN: We are on the second floor. We have our own little section where I call my spot " ; My Space." ; I have my sewing machines and the other artist, Susan Stubbins has her space. We have our own kitchenette and bathroom and the loft has a library and computer area, office. Part of it is a gallery, actually most of it is a gallery because we have things hanging on the walls, but we bill ourselves as a studio/gallery. We do get people coming up during the week as well to check out our work. It is a very inspiring space. KM: Tell me about sharing the space with another person. SN: That is one of the best parts. It is so nice to have someone else. I think as an artist we actually tend to be, or maybe that is just me, we tend to be kind of loners where we can kind of seclude ourselves and become anti-social maybe even, but having another person to bounce ideas off of kinds of keeps you in the here and now maybe even. It is wonderful. We share the expenses of the building but beyond that it is a camaraderie. She inspires me. I inspire her. Good news is that she was an art teacher for 30 years, I believe, and she often has suggestions for me. I really have no art background so she will make composition suggestions or give me little ideas and I think I do the same for her. I' ; ve thrown away scraps of fabric and I' ; ve found them on her pieces later, which even in the trash she thought she could use them. We just have a really good working relationship and I think it is just a positive for both of us. In fact, I' ; ve even had other people say how lucky we are to have another person to share a space with I think for those reasons. KM: Tell me about your creative process. SN: My creative process. I kind of work, for a while I was worried about what I should be making and I finally decided I' ; m just going to make what I want to make, what comes to me instead of looking at an upcoming show and thinking ' ; hum I wonder what will get into that show, what could I make that would fascinate those people' ; . I have just started creating what comes from my heart intuitively and that seems to be the work that catches people' ; s eyes, things that, it is hard to describe. Even last year, I just decided whatever I' ; m thinking about, wanting to make, if I just want to try a leaf, I' ; m going to do a leaf. I have a whole series of leaves that are still coming on. Of course I' ; ve always got my beads and buttons and bobbles and laces and things like that, rickrack is one of my favorites to add to the pieces. I love working in wool. Wool is so soft and it melts, the threads melt into the wool. I love adding touches of wool. I don' ; t know, I seem to have a good flow going right now where I' ; ve got several pieces going at one time, always got something in my brain working, something on a piece of paper, a couple in process. I feel real lucky at the moment to not be puzzling too much about what it is I' ; m making. I' ; ve had a few commissions lately and I' ; ve been fortunate that those were commissions that I could do pretty much I wanted to within a color perimeter and maybe, for example I just did a goddess, moon goddess quilt. All I had were color perimeters and the fact that they wanted a moon goddess on it. That was fun because they didn' ; t care what I put on it beyond that. I feel very fortunate. KM: What advice would you offer someone starting out? SN: For someone starting out, I feel like I' ; m still just starting out even though I' ; ve been doing this for over 30 years probably, but only seriously maybe in the last 10. I would say just follow your heart. Do what rings true to you, what resonates for you. Don' ; t hold yourself up to competition. Don' ; t think about whether or not someone else is going to like it. If you love it, again if it rings true for you then I think that' ; s what works for me personally. KM: Do you belong to any art or quilt groups? SN: Yes. I belong locally to the Zanesville Appalachian Art Project, the initials are ZAAP. It is a little grassroots group here in Zanesville promoting arts and artists in the area. Also the Artist Colony of Zanesville, which I already talked about. I belong to the Studio Art Quilt Associates [SAQA.], which is an international group of studio art quilters. The Ohio Art League which is a state art group. Wow, I think that' ; s it. KM: Why is belonging to these groups important to you? SN: Oh, I forgot a group, Art Quilt Network. That is an awesome group. It is another international quilt group. Belonging to these groups, I think it is important to network with other people, it is a good way to promote yourself, to get your work out there, seen by other people, but for like Art Quilt Network or SAQA there is so many opportunities for an artist to learn business aspects, to help promote yourself in that manner. I think it is important to get together with other like-minded people and find out what they are doing. Pick their brains, they pick yours. That you are normal, maybe. [laughs.] You are on the same track. They are good groups. You get back what you give too. I think the more involved you are the more you get out of it. I' ; ve always believed that. KM: How many hours a week do you quilt? SN: I am physically in the studio usually by 9:00 every day and stick around until 5:00. I do find myself frittering away time on the computer. I would say I try to stay focused on work so five to six hours a day, Monday through Friday. I try not to come down on the weekends to the studio, but I find myself thinking I could be working on that if I were down there. KM: Is that a negative to having to go to work so to speak? SN: No, I think it' ; s a positive. That was one reason, it took a while for me to take that jump to work, go to a studio outside of my home. I had a home studio, sewing room and I always found myself finding other things to do at home, answering the phone, doing the laundry, etc. I get actually, I do better home care because when I' ; m home that' ; s what I' ; m doing rather than being drawn to work on my art and I absolutely treat coming to the studio like a job and I don' ; t mean that as a negative at all. I look forward to it. It' ; s the place I want to be. Once again, I feel very fortunate that I have the space and that I' ; m doing what I love and that I' ; m able to do that. KM: You mentioned the support of your husband. What does your family think of your quiltmaking? SN: [laughs.] They are coming around. I think they' ; ve always thought I was a crafter. They were interested, amused, interested, but not overly respectful. I will say that the first time I sold a piece I got a lot more attention from everybody, especially my husband. When he' ; s friends started asking me--I got a commission or two from some of his friends who are local businessmen, he was definitely more intrigued and interested. It seems a little sad that is what it takes for someone to make some money at it maybe for them to realize that I was serious. He is a total supporter now. I mean he bought the building, the warehouse building that we are in now so we moved our studio from an office building, an office space to the warehouse just in December, so I mean he is totally supportive and it' ; s been great. There was a time when I had to tell my, I felt the need to tell my family that if someone asks, ' ; What your mom does for a living?' ; Tell them, ' ; She' ; s an artist.' ; [laughs.] Not necessarily a ' ; housewife' ; or ' ; I don' ; t know what she does.' ; I felt that need at one point for them to understand that was important to me even though I had to convince myself that I felt that way, but I wasn' ; t hiding behind the mask of artist. It took a while for me to feel comfortable with that hat as well. For the most part, they are very supportive and they' ; ve really jumped on the bandwagon with me now. KM: You call yourself an artist or do you do quiltmaker? SN: I call myself an artist, a quilt artist, a textile artist. Yes, that is what I feel that I am. Like I said, it took some courage. I think a lot of us in this field, for me at least, it' ; s always taken me that step to just dive in and do it. To call myself an artist and hope that my--I will say that some of my friends, quiltmaking friends, and I consider myself a quiltmaker. I' ; m absolutely a quiltmaker. I' ; m a quilt artist, but when I took the step to have my own studio outside the home and call myself an artist there was a lack of support there. I think it was just because honestly it was a change, it was something different, and they wanted me to stay the same maybe. I' ; m not sure, but now I don' ; t feel that way. I think people are happy for me. KM: What do you think is the biggest challenge confronting quiltmakers today? SN: I' ; m not sure, being taken seriously. That it' ; s not just a craft that it is art, at least in my area of quiltmaking. I feel that even in the artist community that I' ; m in my work has been referred to as " ; chick art" ; and I' ; m not offended by that, but I got the sense that I' ; m low. Being a textile artist or a quilt artist is low on the food chain as it were of artists, that people who do sculpture and oil painting. They hold themselves in higher esteem. I think they struggle with the fact that is it a craft or is it an art. It is coming around. I really feel quilt artists are getting more recognition from the art work, from the fine art world. Absolutely. KM: Whose works are you drawn to and why? SN: Oh wow, there is many people' ; s. That is a tough question. I' ; ve always admired Susie Shie' ; s work and it is probably because hers were so heavily embellished and I love words. I love the word on anything. So the fact that she journals on her quilts, I' ; ve always admired and appreciated that. Wow, who else? There' ; s very many. Natasha Kemper I think is her name. I' ; ve always admired her work. I' ; ve never seen any in person but in books and magazines. Probably the people' ; s work I admire I probably have a similar style or it' ; s the fact that I love the embellishing so anybody who embellishes I' ; m probably right there looking at that. KM: What do you think makes a quilt artistically powerful? SN: What makes a quilt artistically powerful? [pause.] Color, I' ; m not sure. When I look at a piece, there is usually something that grabs me. That is tough. I' ; m working on trying to notice, trying to think deeper and think about when something grabs my attention specifically, what was it that grabbed my attention? Why does this piece speak to me? I don' ; t know, for Sacred Threads that' ; s another good point because when you go to Sacred Threads you may look at a piece, a quilt hanging there and think, ' ; Hum, I don' ; t get it,' ; but you read the Artist Statement and oh my gosh that makes it very powerful. I wish a lot of, I wish fine art galleries hung more artist statements that describe what was going on or what the thought process was when creating that piece because maybe it' ; s because I don' ; t have any art training but I can look at some pieces and think, ' ; I don' ; t get it.' ; A lot of artists feel that their work should speak for itself, stand on its own and that' ; s all fine and good, but sometimes just having that Artist Statement there that description really nails it. I' ; m working hard to realize what it is that draws me to things, to art work so that I can internalize that and work with it maybe. KM: What made you decide to enter the quilt into Sacred Threads? SN: The first time I went to a Sacred Threads show I was just blown away by the impact that show has. I think that show should be recognized on a national/international level because it is such a deep thoughtful show and I just wanted to be a part of it. Every year I' ; m working, thinking in the back of my mind, that I hope to get a piece in that show, at least one piece each time. I feel it is a wonderful important show and because of what it speaks to. The experience of women or men but what kind of passion and heart they put into their work it really comes through and sings in this show. I am always honored to be a part of the show when I' ; ve been accepted, when my work has been accepted. I would go even if I haven' ; t, I' ; ve been fortunate enough to be accepted each year that I' ; ve attempted, but I would go no matter what and I am a great promoter, I tell everyone that they need to get to this show because it is a wonderful show for people who perhaps aren' ; t even interested in quilt art. It is a very inspiring, very inspiring show. KM: What is your piece that you have in for this year? SN: I have a piece called " ; Frozen in Time" ; and it is a small piece. I entered it under either Healing or Grief. It is funny how I' ; m never quite sure which I go with. The statement with it was about how our son has a drug addiction problem, he is 24 and how your life can become sort of frozen in time with worry and fear for someone that you love. I can barely even talk about it right now. It is very sad to have someone with a problem like that. You can only do so much and then it is out of your control and you just feel frozen. You are paralyzed because you can' ; t do anything to fix the problem, that person has to fix the problem and it is just a very, very difficult journey and it will be a lifetime journey for him and I hope and pray that he makes it. KM: You said it was a small piece. " ; Token of Love" ; is 46 [inches.] by 32 inches, is that a typical size for you? SN: That is more typical, yes. Currently I am working smaller. I' ; ve discovered that, in fact, I have a lot of small pieces that I' ; m framing. I still consider them quilts because they are three layers but people, to sell my work people are way more accepting of things that look like they are supposed to hang on the wall whereas I think that would be another answer to problems that quilt artists face today is getting people to understand that piece can hang on the wall, it doesn' ; t have to go on a bed. Yes, I' ; m working smaller. " ; Token of Love" ; is one of my larger pieces currently. KM: In what ways do you think your quilts reflect your community and region? I mean Ohio has always been known for art quilts. SN: Right. Maybe because I actually grew up in Athens [Ohio.] and was able to go to Quilt National whenever it was in town and even at that time I was still making traditional quilts but I knew some day I was taking that step. There is that courage thing again, I just had to work up enough courage to step off that edge and try something different. Yes, there is a lot of exposures to art quilts in Ohio. I' ; m living in Appalachia, and Muskingum County is an Appalachian County and we used to have a show at the local college called " ; Women of Appalachia." ; I would put art quilts into those shows and that would be surprising to a lot of people that they are still thinking quilts belong on beds. So there is in my region of Ohio between, ' ; What is art and what isn' ; t?' ; KM: How were your quilts received in the " ; Women of Appalachia" ; exhibit? SN: It is hard to tell. I actually won some awards so obviously the juror appreciated the work because they want traditional quilts but it is also an art show. That is what is interesting. Some of my pieces have won awards in local art shows which that means a lot to me in that they' ; ve accepted this as art in a region where most quilts are the traditional quilts, bed quilts. That was exciting. KM: Is there a particular style of traditional quilts in your region? SN: No, I don' ; t think there is anything, no particular style- just your traditional Log Cabin, Dresden Plate, a lot of piecing. Yes, probably more piecing than appliqué. KM: How do you want to be remembered? SN: That is funny because I think intuitively when we make quilts it is like a way of showing, having something to show for what you' ; ve done for your days. Sort of just cleaning, dusting, cooking, you actually have something for the world to see, or something to be remembered by. I don' ; t have anything in particular that I would like, anyway that I would like to be remembered other than hopefully a good person, a nice person. [laughs.] No, I haven' ; t really thought about that. KM: You mentioned photo transfer and using that in your work. What advances in technology has influenced your work? SN: The computer and the printer. I very much enjoy using the transfer techniques, like using my mother' ; s photographs and put it into fabric. Even in " ; Token of Love," ; I took an old postcard and scanned it and transferred it to fabric. So one of the gloves is holding an old postcard that says " ; A Token of Love." ; That is where I got the name. I have another piece that I have only three recipe cards that had my mother' ; s handwriting on them so I actually transferred those cards to fabric and that is one of my favorite pieces. I have her handwriting in fabric now and I made it look like three recipe cards and then I went to the antique stores here in town and looked for utensils that used to hang, that used to be in our drawer at home in the kitchen and then I found an old tea towel. I didn' ; t want to use one of my mom' ; s but I' ; ve got an old tea towel so I matted these on an old tea towel and I actually found the little tin measuring spoons and the little basting brush and a little potato peeler. They all three look exactly like they could have come right from my mother' ; s kitchen drawer so I sewed those down to the quilt. I still combine new methods with old methods, but the computer would probably be the most advanced technology that I incorporate into my work, otherwise I still love hand work. I use the sewing machine more than I used to as far as finishing my pieces with machine quilting, but I don' ; t have an embroidery machine or anything like that. Not much do I use technology. KM: Do you find it easy to come up with titles for your quilts? SN: Not always, not always. Sometimes when I' ; m working on a piece you just, you immediately know what the title is just because it fits in with what you are thinking but I do sometimes struggle with titles. It is like I' ; m still making something because I want to add something to it, like leaves I' ; m thinking, ' ; How can I add buttons and beads to these?' ; I' ; m not necessarily thinking, ' ; What will I call this when I' ; m finished with it?' ; KM: You talk about doing series. Do you generally do a series and why is doing a series important? SN: The series that has just come up in the last few years I have found myself with ink jet transfers for example, like in a whole series of those because I just kept playing with it and finding other ways to use, other images to transfer. I transferred. I took live oak leaves and scanned them and then I applied them 3-D to another piece so that they actually look like oak leaves all over this quilt. I think it is important to do series just because you keep working, for me I' ; m working through ideas and thinking, ' ; Hum, I wish I had done this.' ; Well, go ahead and do it. Try it in the next piece. The Crazy Quilts was a series. I keep coming back to those because I' ; m doing more collage work with old antique things rather than the crazy piecing, but I kind of have those two series. Like if I' ; m not working on one, I' ; m working on another. I go back and forth between them. For example, the Ginkgo series I' ; m working on I' ; ve just been doing them in greens, but now I' ; m thinking, ' ; What would happen if I started using different colors instead of them looking natural, try different colors, try different fabrics?' ; So it is just a way of working to keep pushing myself a little bit and go deeper. I' ; m trying to figure out what does ginkgo mean to me. Why am I doing ginkgos leaves? I think that is part of the series is going deeper. KM: Is there anything that you would like to share that we haven' ; t touched upon before we conclude? SN: No I' ; m just very humbled to be asked to be interviewed. It is wonderful to be able to share my thoughts and work and I really appreciate it. Thank you for the job you are doing. KM: Thank you. You are more than welcome. Let' ; s see if there is anything else that I would like to ask you. You talk about embellishment, what is your favorite embellishing thing [SN laughs.] I noticed that in " ; Token of Love" ; there is a lot of buttons. SN: Buttons and beads. KM: Buttons and beads? SN: Those are my favorites. I' ; m leaning towards keys too. I haven' ; t used a lot of them yet but I' ; m collecting them. I have little collections. Just like the kitchen utensils, I' ; ve found some really cool kitchen utensils and I' ; m trying to think, ' ; How can I work those into something some day?' ; But I always come back to buttons, beads, rickrack. I love rickrack and laces. If something requires--some pieces don' ; t, you can' ; t put lace on it, it just wouldn' ; t look right. That might be part of my series is pushing that to see how can I fit lace into this. Who knows? KM: Do you shop often? Are you out looking for things? SN: No, but you know what now that you say that one of my absolute favorite things to use are found objects and you can' ; t go looking for found objects, you just have to stumble over them. That is the thing about a found object, I' ; ve got a whole collection of stuff that I have found on the street that I can' ; t wait to use, just like from old rusted things, springs and bottle caps. As far as shopping, no I don' ; t, I should use what I have. I' ; ve probably done my fair share of shopping in the past and now it' ; s time to start using it up. KM: How do you store all of your found objects? SN: I have a lot of, like buttons are in tons of different jars, different sizes of jars. The found objects--I have little boxes, little like Altoid Mint boxes. That is what I have my found objects, that little collection, is in. Also when we go on trips, different places I bring things back from when we were in Portland, Maine, for example, the rocks and the shells there are so different from what they are in North Carolina. I just have little collections all over the place that some day I will use, but I just have plastic bins with drawers in them that I store stuff in. That is fun when you go to clean you always find all those things that you are reminded that you want to use. KM: I want to thank you for taking time out of your day and sharing with me. SN: Thank you, it' ; s been fun. KM: Good, so we are going to conclude our interview at 9:59. 2020 Quilt Alliance. All Rights Reserved. audio 0 https://quiltalliance.net/ohms-viewer-master/viewer.php?cachefile=OH43068-005.xml OH43068-005.xml
Interview sponsor
Name of interview sponsor
Charlotte Enfield
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Identifier
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OH43068-005
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audio
Title
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Susan Nash
zzz
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Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Karen Musgrave
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Irene Goodrich
OHMS Object
https://quiltalliance.net/ohms-viewer-master/viewer.php?cachefile=OH43212-003.xml
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5.4 Interview with Irene Goodrich OH43212-003 Quilters' S.O.S. -- Save Our Stories The Ohio Quilts!! QSOS Quilt Alliance Irene Goodrich Karen Musgrave 0 https://quiltalliance.net/qsos-audio/OH43212-003 Goodrich.mp3 Other audio Oral History Karen Musgrave (KM): This is Karen Musgrave and I am conducting a Quilters' ; S.O.S. - Save Our Stories interview with Irene Goodrich. Today is June 19, 2008. It is 3:25 in the afternoon. We are in Columbus, Ohio and this is a demo interview being done at a training here at the National Quilting Association' ; s show. Irene, thank you for taking the time to do this interview with me. Please tell me about the quilt you brought for this interview. Irene Goodrich (IG): This here is one pattern of nine in a series of designs by Susan R. Du Laney of Albuquerque, New Mexico and I just love her patterns. She just draws one out right after the other, as well as we would write really, so I have tons of her patterns and I' ; ve done several of this series, not all of them, but I plan to do them all if I live long enough. [laughs.] I' ; m just what you call a traditional appliquér. I mark my pattern on the background and I make a template for each color and I baste my edge under and then I match my thread and appliqué them down. I use a #3 hard lead pencil on light fabric to do my marking. I use, well you don' ; t want this right now, but anyway, I guess that is about all on this one. KM: You can tell me whatever you want. IG: I believe that will do it for this one. But I love iris, so I' ; ve done may iris pieces. I collect iris patterns. KM: Now this is hand quilted. IG: Oh yes, I do all of my quilting by hand. Someone made the remark that hand quilting is going out of style, and I said not as long as I' ; m alive. [laughs.] I always put all the information that I can on the back. KM: Let' ; s turn it over and tell me what information you have put on here. IG: It is my #77 wall hanging. I' ; m up over one hundred right now. I numbered from number one. I tell it is made by myself and my location, the size of the piece, the content of the fabrics and the threads and the batt [batting.], and the day I begun and the day I finished. The amount of hours in the construction. KM: Wow. IG: The amount of hours in the quilting to equal a total. Then I sign it and date it, and I always date all my pieces on the last day that I put the last stitch in it. I also keep a record in books at home. I have several books, one for wall hangings and one for quilts and one for minis. Put all the information that I can in those on the back. KM: What are your plans for this quilt? IG: I really don' ; t have any. [laughs.] I really don' ; t have any plans for it. I do give away a lot, and right now I' ; m selling a lot. Selling a lot of my items. If someone comes along and wants to purchase it, I probably will sell it because I' ; m in my eighties and I' ; m not going to be here forever, trying to downsize. I don' ; t know if I should say this in here or not, but right now I have either a block or a wall hanging or a full size quilt or a combination of the three in half of the forty-eight states, and some in Canada, and I have a block in Copenhagen, Denmark in a quilt, and I have three wall hangings somewhere in the Orient. I don' ; t know exactly where they are right now. KM: That is pretty exciting. What do you think somebody would conclude looking at this quilt about you? IG: Well that is hard for me to determine. KM: What do people think about your quilts? IG: I get lots of compliments I know that. Really I' ; ve gotten a lot of them in this show already. Got one just on the way up here. KM: What did they say? IG: My gorgeous quilts, they saw my gorgeous quilts hanging in the show and of course I always graciously thank them for a nice compliment. KM: Tell me about your interest in quiltmaking. IG: I will start at the beginning. When I was about four and a half or five years old my family had moved and I was getting under my dad' ; s feet, he had sort of a short fuse, so he screamed at my mother to take that child somewhere and sit her down in the corner out of his way. She took me to the front room of the house, I can just picture it in my mind now, it had a lot of glass in the front and there was no furniture in it. She sat me down in the corner and she got a piece of white fabric and she threaded a needle with black thread. My mother was a good size and I was a scrubby kid. She put some cloth around my needle finger and put her big brass thimble on my finger and taught me how to use the thimble from the very beginning, and she said you want to try to make tiny stitches, so with this black thread on the white fabric, you can see how you are progressing. I took to it like a duck to water and shortly after that she cut out squares and then triangles and put the triangles on each one, she called it squares and corners. Recycling is nothing new to us, then your sugar and salt came in cloth bags and they were sewn together with a chain stitch, so when she used the salt and the sugar she would take out the chain stitch and bleach out the wording in the fabric and dye it. On this particular quilt, she dyed it red. I had the top done before I started school at the age of seven, and it wasn' ; t a quilt until 1968 which began my quilting career. Let' ; s see, I come from a line of quilters. My mother would say that when she and her three sisters were going to high school they would always hurry home and get their lessons done so that they could quilt for an hour before they had to go to bed. Both my grandmothers are quilters. None of my sisters quilt, I' ; m the quilter of the family. It just took off from there. What else do I have to tell you? I seriously got into quilting in 1968. My husband and I didn' ; t have any children but I had nineteen nieces and nephews and my sister back here had five that were our children, so I began to make quilts for nineteen nieces and nephews. I added seven brothers and sisters and my parents and I' ; ve been avidly quilting ever since. KM: What made you start in ' ; 68? IG: I was aware that there was becoming an interest in quilts. At first I was the only quilter in the area, but now it is really going great guns, which pleases me immensely. KM: What does your family think of your quiltmaking? IG: Oh they are my greatest fans. [laughs.] They all have their quilts, some of them have two, two quilts, two full size quilts. KM: How many hours a week do you spend on quiltmaking? IG: I' ; m a widow now and live in this big old house by myself and so I can only quilt every other day because I can not quilt with anything on the finger. I can' ; t do anything with hands covered, even digging in the dirt, so I quilt Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and then on the other days I do whatever has to be done, wash the clothes, clean the house, mow the lawn or whatever, or get a new project ready. It is my life right now, just keeps me going. I want to mention that quilting is wonderful therapy. Beginning in 1970 when my husband and I had to take care of his mother and she was in our home in bed, and I think beginning in the early eighties my father became ill and for about ten years I had to go back and forth between the states of Virginia and Ohio. I had to get power of attorney for both of my parents and see to their affairs, and then January 31, 1997 my husband had a hemorrhage stroke and going on eight years, well he passed away in 2004, and I want to tell everyone that if you get into a situation like that quilting is the best therapy that you can possibly do. It saved me. KM: What do you find the most pleasing about quiltmaking? IG: Color and the beautiful fabrics that they are doing for us today and all of these wonderful books. When I first got into quilting I think we had two quilt books, one by, is it Marguerite Ickis and the other one was " ; 101 Patchworks" ; by I can' ; t think of the author' ; s name right now. I just marvel at all the books we have and then all of a sudden all these appliqué books that are out there, which is my forte. I would rather appliqué than anything. I don' ; t like to piece any more. I love to quilt. I do the quilting. KM: Do you quilt on a frame? IG: I do have a floor frame, which I am not going to use any more. I have every shape of hoop that there is, moon shape, square, round, oblong. [laughs.] I use those mostly now. KM: Why did you move to using a hoop and not a frame? IG: It is difficult for me to handle the frame alone now, it takes two people to get a quilt in, but you do I think get your best quilted product on the floor frame, I have always felt that. Mostly I just use about I think a 15" ; hoop now and I can sit in my front room and just quilt away. KM: Tell me about your involvement in the National Quilting Association. IG: I was subscribing to a little magazine, it was a needlework magazine called Stitch ' ; n Sew. I don' ; t know if you are aware of it or not and it covered every type of needlework. They later had a Stitch ' ; n Sew Quilt Magazine and I don' ; t think it is available any more or being published any more but I saw an ad from a lady by the name of Ella Anderson out in California and she wanted a store for her calico, where I knew where it was at the Vermont Country Store in Vermont because every October my husband and I spent three weeks vacation up there in the beautiful color leaves section, so I wrote her a short note telling her and in due time she wrote back a ten page letter, and she was telling me about National Quilting Association and I was very interested so I became a member. At that time I didn' ; t have chapters, I was just a member and now we have the two chapters in Columbus and I' ; m a member of both of those. I started getting their newsletter in 1972, but anything quilty, well I was very interested. I started out as a collector. When my husband and I would travel I would get the phone book and look under Q to see what there was in that area that had to do with quilting, and I met a lot of people that way and found a lot of sources. For instance, we were in Pennsylvania one time and someone told me that somewhere in Amish country there was a barn full of fabric, so I chased that down and truly it was a new barn with just bolts of fabric everywhere. One time we were going through Georgia and there were signs out around every turn, " ; Quilts Here," ; so we went to this one home and the lady very cordially invited us in to see her quilts and she told me about another barn full of fabric. In this particular one, it was stacked from the floor to the ceiling, so if you wanted a bolt on the bottom it was your task to remove all those bolts to get to the one you wanted, but that was more fun. [laughs.] I' ; m a fabricolic. In my bedroom there are three chests and a dresser full of fabric and in the closet of that bedroom there is boxes of fabric. In the guest bedroom where my friend is staying, the closet is full of boxes of fabric. In my living room there is a desk, one drawer is full of fabric. In my dining room there is a buffet full of fabric. In a spare room upstairs I have forty gallon bins, six or eight of them full of fabric. I could open my own shop. KM: How do you find everything? IG: I don' ; t sometimes. [laughs.] I know I have a certain piece in the house and you can believe it or not sometimes I have to go through every one of those storage places I told you about to find what I want. In the meantime I' ; m growling to myself. [laughs.] KM: Do you plan things out? How do you go about deciding what to place where when you make a quilt? IG: I' ; m no good at drawing, so I have to use someone else' ; s patterns, and I always draw it off onto the background and then make my templates and cover it wherever. That is the way I work. KM: How do you go about selecting? How did you decide to make this orange and make three different colors of orange? IG: There is a color sheet and I have always followed her color sheet and I duplicate it exactly. KM: Good for you. IG: Same shade as she has. I know iris come in all colors, but I always think of purple when I do iris. KM: Is there any part of quiltmaking that you don' ; t enjoy? IG: No. KM: Like it all? IG: Yes I do. KM: That is good. What do you think makes a quilt artistically powerful? IG: You have to say the design, the colors used, and the person' ; s interpretation of the pattern I suppose. Is that good enough? KM: Sure, you bet. What do you think makes a great quiltmaker? IG: A person that is dedicating to quilting. You have to have the interest to want to do this, the quilt. KM: What do you think about the changes in technology and how quiltmaking has grown? IG: It is very competitive. I don' ; t, myself follow most of it, I' ; m strictly a traditional quilter and that is pretty much what I can do. If there is an artistic piece out there, I don' ; t try to think that I could do it, of course I probably can' ; t, but I just do what I can do. KM: Why is quiltmaking important to you? IG: I think in the several members of my family there is artistic streaks and mine happens to be quilting. I have three sisters that can paint, or do paint and one still paints, and I have a brother that does woodcarving. He has never had a lesson in his life and you should see what he does. He just does gorgeous things. Our father was a number one carpenter and I think there are some [carpenters.] of the grandchildren or nieces and nephews out there. I heard my sister say this morning that one of her granddaughters is very into art and we have a nephew that writes poetry, so there seems to be an artistic element, if you want to call me an artist. KM: Do you call yourself an artist? Do you feel that you' ; re an artist? IG: Not a painting artist, but I call myself, I guess a fabric artist maybe. KM: What do you think is the biggest challenge confronting quiltmakers today? IG: I' ; m not sure if I have an answer for that. I hope they keep it going, don' ; t let it die. KM: Do you think it will die? IG: I don' ; t think it will anyway soon. I know they keep inventing new things. We don' ; t just don' ; t know how far it is going to go. KM: Do you have a design wall? IG: No. KM: Why don' ; t you have a design wall? IG: I really don' ; t have any place for it in my crowded house. [laughs.] KM: In what ways do you think your quilts reflect your community or region? IG: I don' ; t know whether they do or not. Do they? KM: I don' ; t know. IG: I don' ; t know either. KM: Do you belong to quilt groups? You mentioned something about being in the chapter. IG: I' ; m a charter member of Quintessential Quilters, Columbus Metropolitan Quilters, The Appliqué Society, AQS [American Quilters Society.], and almost in NQA. KM: Why is belonging to these different organizations important to you? IG: I just love quilting that much. Interested in all of it. I want to support it as much as I can. KM: Is anybody in the group like to ask a question? Here is your opportunity. Silence. [IG laughs.] Janet White (JW): Tell us about your relationship with Cuesta [Banberry.]. IG: Yes, have any of you met Cuesta? You know about her I' ; m sure. She has been a friend of mine for a long, long time. Let' ; s see, how did I originally meet her? I' ; m losing my memory on some things in the past. I' ; m not sure how I first met her but some years ago she came to Columbus. She only had one son and he lived here in Columbus. She came to Columbus this one time and came to my home and Marguerite Wiebusch happened to be a guest in my home at the time and Cuesta has special information. You know the Ohio Museum has the Hatfield McCoy quilt and Cuesta had some extra information on the quilt that they didn' ; t have and we had made an appointment with Ellice Ronsheim, who at that time was the curator at the museum, so she took us into the warehouse and showed us all those kinds of quilts to Cuesta and her son. He was so patient while his mother was there and we just had a grand time. I visited her home and I suppose all of you know that she was a quilt, one of the top quilt historians. In her home she had this closed in back porch with all of these boxes and stacks and piles of stuff, catalogued properly that she turned over to the museum not too long ago in New York, and she was a likeable person. We corresponded all the time. She sent me patterns and I sent material of mine to her and she made a scrape book about me, and I don' ; t know what became of it, I am curious of what became of it. She mailed it to me one time to look at and I mailed it back to her. She was a collector of the old kit quilts. She had tons of the old kit quilts and she had, I think it was called American Beauty Rose and she had two of them done by two different companies at the time just alike and I wanted to buy one of them from her [laughs.] but she didn' ; t sell it to me. I did a quilt for her grandson. I quilted it for her, for her grandson one time. I did a quilt business out of my home. I had to take early retirement because of health reasons and for about ten years I worked on quilts out of my home, repairing quilts, I did what ever they needed. For instance there was a doctor in my neighborhood that all I did three different times was cut out ocean waves for her, three different color waves, or different color waves each time. She was originally from Austria, her mother still lived over there, and she mailed these cut out pieces to her mother, her mother would sew the top and then it would come back to our neighborhood and another quilt friend, Mrs. Ellen Meyers, would quilt them for her. My husband was a photographer and I was so disgusted with myself that I didn' ; t have him take before and after photos of all of this work that I did. It was so rewarding. Sometimes I would take the worst rag you can image and restore it. I just did whatever was needed, binding, just one little patch or a whole lots of patches and replace fabric and re-quilt, whatever. I discovered that a lot of damage is done by pets, dogs and cats they love quilts. They do damage. That was really rewarding, I enjoyed it so much, but it got to the place where I couldn' ; t do anything for myself, which was frustrating. [laughs.] I' ; ve quilted for people and just all kinds of things. KM: Tell me about teaching. IG: Yes I taught appliqué throughout Ohio for several years and I started to work in the Ohio Research Project but I had to quit because my husband became ill so I didn' ; t finish with that. KM: What did you like about teaching? IG: The love of the students liking to learn something I suppose. I usually had them write out what they thought of what I did for them and I taught a little bit differently. I took some workshops myself quite a bit and when I taught I made up whatever I was going to teach, I made up a block first and then they were all going to do the same block, they would have their supply list and so I made another block right along with my students so that I wouldn' ; t forget any steps. They liked that. Went over real well. Had I been able to get into quilting sooner, I would have done what a lot of the quilters are doing, travel all over and teach, but I didn' ; t have an opportunity to do that. KM: How would you like to be remembered? IG: I don' ; t really know. [laughs.] How I would like to be remembered. Maybe my sister could answer that, how I would like to be remembered. How I would like to be remembered after I leave here? Ruth Shea (RS): As a wonderful quilter is all I know. IG: [laughs.] That is my sister Ruth. KM: We have been talking about thirty minutes, is there anything else you would like to share before we conclude our interview? IG: I don' ; t believe so. I don' ; t know if you would like to have this or not. You know I did a Trunk Show for our show in ' ; 05 and this is the write up that Sandy did for the magazine. I don' ; t know if you would like to have that. KM: We can include this. Tell me about this. It says, " ; Irene Goodrich Extraordinary Woman and Quilter." ; What was the trunk show about? IG: I showed them all the quilts that I had. I had an hour to show them. KM: How many quilts did you show? IG: How many did I have Janet? JW: A bunch. IG: I know when Teri [Henderson Tope.] wheeled them in on the whatever it was she brought them in on, and Pat [Moore.] said, ' ; Oh you only have an hour to do the show,' ; but we got done in due time and had a question and answer time at the end. KM: What is your favorite quilt? IG: Are you aware of the Simply Delicious by? KM: Piece O Cake. IG: Piece O Cake. I changed it a little bit. That is my favorite quilt. KM: How did you change it? Tell me how you changed it. IG: There is one in the show right now that has the little separate squares. Each block is separated with all of these little teeny squares and I didn' ; t want to do that. There was no border so I put the fruits on a gray sort of print background and I think I striped them with color, I don' ; t remember exactly and then I wanted the border so I used Nancy Pearson' ; s Grapevine border on it. I think I used a plum color for to add some color and I made a regular bed size quilt. It won big at the Ohio State Fair, and that is my favorite quilt. There' ; s a couple of people out there that have designs on it. [laughs.] KM: Why is it, tell me why it is your favorite quilt. IG: I like to work with fruits and vegetables and it just appeals to me. It was so much fun to do, and I like to make flowers and fruits and whatever I' ; m doing as much like nature as possible in color and everything. KM: Thank you so much for taking your time today. IG: You are welcome. KM: To come and be my demonstration interview. You did a fabulous job. We are going to conclude our interview at 3:55. 2020 Quilt Alliance. All Rights Reserved. audio 0 https://quiltalliance.net/ohms-viewer-master/viewer.php?cachefile=OH43212-003.xml OH43212-003.xml
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Charlotte Enfield
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Irene Goodrich
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Georgia QSOS
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Interviewee
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Cathy Fussell
Interviewer
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Emma Parker
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Interview Date
February 18, 2021
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Cathy Fussell
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February 18, 2021
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Interviewee
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Coulter Fussell
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Emma Parker
Interview Date
February 26, 2021
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Coulter Fussell
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audio