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Working with antique, pre-1900 quilts, Sanford Biggers makes mixed-media works that present as painted textiles and sculptural installations. The quilt-based works are inspired by the modern and contemporary artistry of the Black women who have been making quilts in Gee’s Bend, Ala., for generations and the rumored lore surrounding quilts as signposts and communications vehicles on the Underground Railroad. 

After a rigorous selection process, The Freedom Quilting Bee Legacy is excited to announce, it has selected Brown Studio Architecture of Montgomery to revitalize the historic building of the Freedom Quilting Bee (The Bee), and to develop a master site plan for its 14+ surrounding acres. The Bee was a women’s quilting cooperative in rural Alabama begun in 1966. Just before leading the marches from Selma to Montgomery, AL, in 1965, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. passed through Alberta and the hamlet of Gee’s Bend and encouraged its 900 residents to register to vote. It was Dr. King’s visit and message which the founding women derived the name “Freedom Quilting Bee”, through the vote Black people would gain ‘freedom’.

Curated by Legacy Russell, Executive Director & Chief Curator of The Kitchen, ‘The New Bend’ brings together 12 contemporary artists working in the raced, classed, and gendered traditions of quilting and textile practice – Anthony Akinbola, Eddie R. Aparicio, Dawn Williams Boyd, Diedrick Brackens, Tuesday Smillie, Tomashi Jackson, Genesis Jerez, Basil Kincaid, Eric N. Mack, Sojourner Truth Parsons, Qualeasha Wood, and Zadie Xa. Their unique visual vernacular exists in tender dialogue with, and in homage to, the contributions of the Gee’s Bend Alabama quilters – Black American women in collective cooperation and creative economic production – and their enduring legacy as a radical meeting place, a prompt, and as intergenerational inspiration.

Sanford Biggers is an artist who mixes media and pushes boundaries to create an art all his own. Jeffrey Brown looks at his interdisciplinary work, focusing on a signature piece, “Fool’s Folly.”

This past Wednesday, November 17, a regal portrait by the celebrated artist Amy Sherald sold for $3.9 million, double its $1.2 million-to-$1.8 million estimate, in the 20th-century and contemporary evening sale at Phillips New York. Welfare Queen (2012), listed in the catalogue as hailing from “a private East Coast collector,” was consigned by Dr. Imani Perry, the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University.

Apollo’s annual celebration of achievements in the art world. The Acquisition of the Year Award commends the best museum acquisitions of the past 12 months.

According to the latest United States Census, the South is home to nearly 40 percent of all Americans, making it the most populous region in the country. It is also the least supported by arts funding. A recent study found that a person living in the South received only $4.21 in arts and culture funding from philanthropy, compared to the national average of $8.60 per person. If you’re reading this in New York or Boston, know that Northeasterners receive about $16.

Greg Lauren’s line has always been rooted in American identity, but for his latest collection he wanted to approach that theme with more specificity. “I started to have a lot of conversations about fashion, about the work, and creating a more equitable company,” said Lauren. “And I wanted to change the way I approach things. I wanted to take a look at the history and roots of things.” Lauren looked at the history of quilts. He’s worked with them before, but started to dig deeper and came across Gee’s Bend, a community of craftswomen in the rural area of Boykin, Alabama, who have a history of quilting that dates back to slavery.