Luke at the Newark Museum

This past Sunday I had the pleasure in accompanying my friend Luke Hayes to the Newark Museum to see his art on view. Luke makes quilts and they are works of art, amazing layers of colors and textures creating photo realistic portraits. The Newark Museum purchased his 'American Gothic' queen sized quilt and it is now on display with multiple historic and significant quilts in an exhibition called 'Patchwork: from folk art to fine art'.  Luke and I had a wonderful day with our friend Ariel and meeting up with the curator Ulysses who gave us a private tour of the museum, saving Luke's piece for dessert.  It was well worth the wait! His quilt looked great in the gallery and was definitely an eye catcher. Ulysses said people will jump when they see it, because the image is so realistic they think there are actually two people standing there.

Luke standing next to his 'American Gothic' at the Newark Museum

a view of the exhibit and Ulysses, Luke, and Ariel

detail of 'American Gothic' courtesy of Luke Haynes

With all Luke's quilts, he uses recycled clothing as his fabric, mixing patterns, textures, and fiber content. He then creates high contrast portraits of himself, friends, historical figures, or everyday objects and machine appliques them on top of a traditionally designed quilt background. The result is a 2-D domestic object filled with depth and meaning, contemporary with a sense of strong history. You can see more of his work and read all about him here and on his blog.

A self portrait of Luke entitled 'Tradition' photo courtesy of Luke Haynes

posted by Sarah