Mary Lee Bendolph, "Ghost Pockets"
Ms. Bendolph is one of the most highly acclaimed quilters in the world, honored with solo shows and books about her work. Barbara Barran has been privileged to become friendly with Ms. Bendolph and her family. She was invited to attend the National Endowment for the Arts award ceremony, and to sit with the Bendolph family at the awards dinner.
Classic Rug Collection was one of the underwriters of Ms. Bendolph’s 80th birthday party in Mobile, AL. Ms. Bendolph is shown at the party with her daughter, Essie Bendolph, another fine quilter.
“Ghost Pockets” is a hand-knotted rug based on one of Ms. Bendolph’s denim quilts. The original quilt has been featured in many exhibitions.
Barbara Barran has been working with the Gee’s Bend Quilters since 2003. She has shown and sold their work at over 25 US museums, paying the quilters a royalty for the use of their designs. She has visited Gee’s Bend, AL, several times and stayed at the home of Ruth Kennedy and Lucy Mingo. Working with the quilters has been the highlight of her design career.
Custom Gee’s Bend Quilt designs and sizes are available. For more information, please write to info@Classicrug.com or call us at 718-768-3338.
100 knot Hand-knotted New Zealand wool rug. Made in India.
About Gee’s Bend
The women of Gee’s Bend—a small, remote, Black community in Alabama—have created hundreds of quilt masterpieces dating from the early twentieth century to the present. Resembling an inland island, Gee’s Bend is surrounded on three sides by the Alabama River. Some seven hundred or so inhabitants of this small, rural community are mostly descendants of slaves, and for generations, they worked the fields belonging to the local Pettway plantation. Enlivened by a visual imagination that extends the expressive boundaries of the quilt genre, these astounding creations constitute a crucial chapter in the history of American art.