Folk Group
History
Gee's Bend is in Wilcox County, Alabama, a county with a very high poverty rate. African American women from Gee's Bend have been quilting since the 19th century, and many of the quiltmakers currently living in Gee's Bend are descendants of those original quiltmakers. All of whom were enslaved and forced to work on cotton plantations before the civil war (Duncan, 2005, 26).
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Most of the quilters from Gee's Bend learn how to quilt informally from the other quilters in their family. Quilters describe learning from their mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and so forth. Some women also describe being self-taught quilters. So while in recent years, some have described Gee's Bend quilts as high art. The women who make them still learn in informal and everyday ways, which is a characteristic of folklore that often differentiates it from high art (Sims and Stephens, 2011, 3).
The quilters of Gees Bend, recipients of the 2015 NEA National Heritage Award. From left to right: Loretta Pettway, Lucy Mingo, and Mary Lee Bendolph. Photo by Tom Pich
"Work Clothes Quilt" Mary Lee Bendolph, 2002. Souls Grown Deep Foundation. Photo: Stephen Pitkin/Pitkin Studio
"My Way" Essie Bendolph. 1990. Souls Grown Deep Foundation. Photo: Stephen Pitkin/Pitkin Studion
In addition to valuing the quilts of their folk group members, the quilters also show their values through the materials that they use. While repurposed clothes may have been born of necessity, it is also true that they hold sentimental value for the quilters. The repurposed clothes that the quilters often use function as a connection to a loved one. Hence, the common use of a husband's work clothes (Sohan, 2015, 309).
The creation of quilts and the quilts themselves also function as a lesson to the quiltmaker. Mary Lee Bendolph describes life as being similar to quiltmaking. Because quiltmaking takes patience, work, time, and faith, she says that sometimes quilts don't work, but you have to keep going with it. Mary Lee Bendolph also says that the process is different for everyone. "I do what I can do, not what other people could do. Sometimes (my daughter) may want to make a quilt like me, but she have to do what her mind tell her. Quilting teach all of this to her"(Sohan, 2015, 309). Mensie Lee Pettway, another quiltmaker from Gee's Bend, reiterates this sentiment by saying that no two quilts should ever be the same and that quilts represent more than warmth. They represent family history and safekeeping (Sohan, 2015, 294).
Mary Lee Bendolph, a well-known quiltmaker from Gee's Bend, describes how many of the quilters would put their quilts out on the line in the Spring. She would walk by the houses, look at the quilts, see ones she liked and go home and try to copy the patterns but make them her own. In addition, Bendolph cites that positive feedback from visitors on her own quilts would inspire her to create more quilts (Sohan, 2015, 301). The Gee's Bend quilters value the opinions of the others in the folk group and are inspired by their contemporaries when creating their text. Additionally, their traditions were not only passed down but shared between current members of the folk group, which is very common (Sims and Stephens, 2011, 69).