For the entire month of February, all who come through the doors of BMCC will have the pleasure of viewing Edward Bostick’s vibrant quilt-work hanging from the ceiling and walls in honor of Black History Month.
African-American quilting, a craft that dates back to the days of slavery, has evolved throughout American history, reflecting storytelling traditions as well as socio-political changes specific to African-American culture. Bostick hopes to revive what he feels is a dying art.
“My grandmother Ollie—she’d make me thread the needle,” he says laughing. Brought up by his grandmother, it’s evident that Bostick quickly mastered the art of threading a needle as well as creating his own intricate designs.
But it was his favorite aunt who inspired Bostick–after she passed away. He inherited her plaid-scrap original, called “Renna,” which he copied after it began to wear.
Bostick, an English instructor, laughingly calls his first quilt a mess. Yet, he’s quick to add that it’s the lack of precision that lends the work an authentic feel.
Historically, many African-American quilts told stories, while others used symbols that were instrumental in the emancipation of slaves. Even after the abolition of slavery, quilting remained a vital tradition in many black communities.
“In the wintertime,” Bostick explains, “women would go around and make quilts for all the families in the area. They’d go with their daughters, but sometimes, the men helped too,” he says, before adding that the men “rarely got any credit.”
Slave women had little time for their own sewing, yet they found time to make simple scrap quilts or other bed coverings for their families. The medium Bostick uses for quilting varies. Sometimes he uses bags of discarded remnant fabric, given to him by people, much in the way slaves did. Other times, he uses silks and elaborately patterened batik. In fact, you’ll often find the signature of painter Sherry Shiny on Bostick’s more elaborate quilts, especially on the pieces featuring images of historically significant African-Americans, such as Rosa Parks and numerous jazz musicians.
“My brother still thinks I’m absolutely crazy and unmanly. I’ve told him it’s not that different from what he does as a carpenter. I work with my hands, he works with his hands.”
Bostick remembers going to Sears Robuck for his first sewing machine and lying to the salesman. “I said it was for my mother,” he says. After he found just the right machine, he brought it home, where it gathered dust for a year before Bostick set out to copy his aunt’s beloved original. Was it the stigma that made Bostick hold out a full year before trying out what he really wanted to do?
“I don’t know about that,” he says. “I personally don’t see sewing as unmanly,” Bostick says. “African-American men have worked as successful tailors throughout history, so I don’t understand how more people don’t make the connection between tailoring and quilting. But it’s unfortunate because quilting is becoming a dying art with Afro-Americans.” He shakes his head mournfully. “The younger generation can’t cook let alone sew.”
Hopefully, Bostick’s beautiful handiwork, which can be viewed in BMCC’s entrance all through Black History Month, will inspire awe as well as innovation. Perhaps a student at BMCC will one day attempt to reproduce Bosticks’s work, much as Bostick did with his aunt’s fading quilt.
- See a complete list of African Hertiage Month events at BMCC.
