Houston Chronicle :: Lone Stars III

Lone Stars III

By Karoline Patterson Bresenhan and
Nancy O'Bryant Puentes
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Quilters have converged upon Houston from all corners of the world for the International Quilt Festival Houston. The internationally renowned event includes hundreds of vendor booths, hands-on classes for all ages, lectures, demos and exhibits of some of the highest- quality art and antique quilts available today.

If you are attending the show, here are 10 must-see events:

1. Lone Stars III exhibit:Texas Quilts Today

At the top of the list is the special exhibit Texas Quilts Today. Experience the work of top Lone Star artists in a variety of styles, techniques and subject matter.

Texas quilts are a special interest of festival founder and director Karey Patterson Bresenhan, who's from Houston, and her cousin Nancy O'Bryant Puentes, who lives in Austin. They've documented Lone Star quilting history in a trilogy of books. The third book, Lone Stars III: Texas Quilts Today 1986-2011 ($29.95 paperback; $50 hardcover, 400 pages, University of Texas Press), was published just in time for this exhibit as well as the opening of their new Texas Quilt Museum in LaGrange on Nov. 13. Festival representative Bob Ruggerio says several quilts on display at the festival will eventually be seen at the museum.

What's so special about Texas quilts? "There's incredible use of color," suggests Bresenham. "Our weather, our skies, our surroundings have influenced them. Color is very much a part of Texas."

Read more at the chron.com »

San Antonio Express-News :: Lone Stars III

Lone Stars III

By Karoline Patterson Bresenhan and
Nancy O'Bryant Puentes
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A stitch in time
Quilting has evolved from utilitarian craft to an expressive art form.
By Steve Bennett

The quilt is more than a security blanket. It can be a family heirloom, a work of art, a snapshot of history, a tangible connection to a person or place long gone, a political statement, a therapeutic release or, in the case of the quilting bee, a community project. Perhaps most of all, it is an expression of pride. To be sure, it is all of these and more. Most owners of a quilt passed down through generations wouldn't take a million dollars for it.

“I haven't met a quilt I didn't love,” says San Antonio quilt artist Leslie Tucker Jenison. “The quilt and quiltmaking is really a good lens to look at history, especially women's history, although there are men quilters nowadays. But it has been and remains basically a women's art form.”

Quilts, notes Nancy O'Bryant Puentes, co-author of a trilogy of beautifully illustrated books on nearly two centuries of Texas quilting, are linked to the entire life cycle, “from conception, to birth, to death.”

“And,” she adds, “they seem to fill some primal need not only for cover, but for self-expression.”

Basically, a quilt is three layers of fabric, stitched together (although some say two layers will suffice).

Quilters come down on two basic sides: those who believe traditional methods and patterns constitute the quilt, and those who create “art quilts,” often abstracted or touching on headline events, which can involve many artistic processes, including dyeing, batik, painting and embellishing surfaces with everything from sequins to buttons. Traditional quilters generally disdain the art crowd, while art quilters cling to the notion that anything goes. Both, apparently, are right.

Today, the art of quilting, which dates back to ancient Egypt, is big business. Some 21 million quilters in the United States spend $3.6 billion annually on their passion.

Read more at mysanantonio.com »