Voltage Quilts by Erica Waaser

Voltage Quilts by Erica Waaser

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The IQM is pleased to present Voltage, a selection of quilts by Erica Waaser. “I construct my quilts,” says Waaser, a native of Germany and an architect. Waaser considers her studio practice both an offshoot and an antidote to her day job in an engineering profession focused on design and function.

Abstract Expressionism is perhaps Waaser’s closest affinity, but she draws inspiration from various patchwork traditions, and from Post-Impressionist to Pop Art painting: Der Blaue Reiter artists like Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee, exuberant colorists like Henri Matisse and David Hockney, and inimitable pattern-makers like Jean Dubuffet and Cy Twombly. Space and matter compete, in the work of all these exemplars, to achieve near-perfect balance.

Waaser uses the medium of collage to develop shape languages, explore color relationships, and resolve questions of scale. The quilts shown here feature a vocabulary of rectangles and energetic lightning bolts. Squares and strips are broken up and reassembled to create surfaces that double as spacious landscapes and solid walls. Waaser deploys the properties of cloth—its softness and its substance—to investigate a relationship between painting and architecture.

Featured Media

Featured Media
Featured Media

Gallery Photos

Gallery Photos
Gallery Photos
This exhibition was made possible through funding from the Nebraska Arts Council and the Nebraska Cultural Endowment. The Nebraska Arts Council, a state agency, has supported this exhibition through its matching grants program funded by the Nebraska Legislature and the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Nebraska Cultural Endowment. Visit www.artscouncil.nebraska.gov for more information. Additional support provided by Friends of International Quilt Museum.
Event Date
Friday, September 29, 2017 to Sunday, February 25, 2018