Guest Artist

“Don’t Be Square”

Guest Artist: Ben Venom

Friday, June 15 and Saturday, June 16

10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. both days

Presented in collaboration with the Frist Center for the Visual Arts

$120, cost includes gallery admission, parking, lunch on both days and some materials.

Registration opens on April 1 HERE.

Join San Francisco-based artist Ben Venom, for a two-day workshop exploring quilt design and construction and the notion that quilting is not just in the domain of folk art.  Venom creates quilts out of his own worn-out heavy metal t-shirts, which have been exhibited in fine art organizations both nationally and internationally.  This workshop will begin at the Frist Center with a tour of the exhibition Creation Story: Gee’s Bend and the Art of Thornton Dial, which elevates quilting as an art form. In the afternoon and the following day, the program will continue at Watkins, where participants will create an individually designed small quilting square from their own t-shirts or found fabrics. The workshop will cover quilt design, appliqué, basting and quilt construction.  No prior experience with quilting is required. Participants must provide their own sewing machines and t-shirts or found fabrics. 

Image: War Bird East, handmade quilt, heavy metal t-shirts, fabric, batting thread.  33” x 35”. 2012.

Creation Story: Gee’s Bend Quilts and the Art of Thornton Dial on display at the Frist Center May 25 through to September 3 explores parallels and intersections in the works of these acclaimed Alabama artists. In the tradition of African American cemetery constructions and yard art, Dial and the quilters of Gee’s Bend harness the tactile properties and symbolic associations of cast-off materials in creating an art of profound beauty and evocative power. Produced against a backdrop of poverty and racism, the appeal of these artworks crosses aesthetic, social, and geographical boundaries, earning widespread recognition as being among the most compelling art of our time.