Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Yoshiko Jinzenji

Yoshiko Jinzenji is everything that is right in the world of modern quilting. She makes quilts that actually look different and new. Her use of color in conservative, but that makes it all the more bold when it is there.

One think I love about her work is the texture. Her quilting is fairly simple, you don't see a lot of curlicues but I think the simplicity makes such a statement. When you look at the quilt on the cover of Quilting Line + Color you can see the texture and without touching it you know how it would feel.

We received Quilting Line + Color last week and it is an inspiration. There are 30 projects; quilts, pillows, samplers and even handbags. It is just amazing to me how clean and new they look. Even her honeycomb quilt which is made with traditional hexagons seems to have new life in this book. Is that the magic of Japanese design, or is it just the magic of Yoshiko Jinzenji?

For those of you local KC folks who read this blog, it turns out that the Spencer Art museum in Lawrence, KS has 12 Yoshiko quilts. Sadly, they are not on display. Perhaps we could convince them otherwise?





I believe this is the Ten Thousand piece quilt that the Spencer has. Amazing.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow - Spencer should definitely do a quilt show featuring her quilts! They're really refreshing. We should bombard them with emails. =)

Unknown said...

Maybe the Spencer would be willing to let us have a quilt show for KCMQG at their facilities in conjunction with an exhibit like this...