Quilt 1935 - 1942

This "Quilt," of unknown date, was made by Francis Law Durand, who lived from 1855 to 1995. It presents a hand-drawn design for a quilt, meticulously divided into numbered and lettered squares. During Durand's lifetime, quilting was not only a craft but a deeply gendered activity, traditionally associated with domesticity and women's work. But let's consider this piece beyond the domestic sphere. The structure here is incredibly ordered; each square is a microcosm of a larger design. Quilts have historically been a medium of storytelling and memory-keeping, a way for women to inscribe their experiences into the fabric of everyday life. The incomplete nature of this quilt pattern prompts questions about absence and presence: what stories are being told, and what voices are missing? Perhaps this unfinished design invites us to contemplate the fragmented nature of memory, the ways in which stories are passed down, altered, and sometimes left incomplete. It is a testament to both the labor and the creative potential embedded in traditionally "feminine" crafts.