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Depicting the Mohawk Nation in striking stitchwork
Carla Hemlock gathers scraps of cloth like a storyteller collects bits of truth. After carefully piecing the assembled fabric, the master quilter stitches together a proud picture of her heritage. Celebrating the Mohawks of Kahnawake who aided New York City’s vertical expansion, her quilt Tribute to the Mohawk Ironworkers (pictured above) is based on Charles Ebbets’ legendary 1932 photograph. Hemlock individually cut each of the 11 men from red fabric before beading the details. The unprecedented work won a blue ribbon at the 2008 Santa Fe Indian Market before being purchased by the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) in Washington, D.C.
Depicting the Mohawk Nation in striking crimson along with the six member nations, a passport, and the words “Pre-dates 1492,” her quilt Haudenosaunee Passport makes a bold statement about citizenship. “Our people have been traveling for years on our own passports,” Hemlock explains, “but in the summer of 2010, a delegation who was returning from Bolivia after representing our people at an environmental conference was not allowed to return, because Canada and the U.S. would not recognize their passports.”
Surprisingly, Hemlock’s quiltmaking did not originate from political ideals: It began 29 years ago when she was expecting her first child. “A good friend of mine said, ‘You need to make your baby a quilt.’ And so I created my first quilt, a quilt for my son, with her help.” Now her work is in high demand, and the awards keep coming — most recently first place in the quilt division at the Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market, and first place in Diverse Arts at the Santa Fe Indian Market for The Faces that Are Yet to Come, a quilt infused with hope. “The first thing we’re told at our meetings is, ‘What should always be foremost in our minds is to remember that the decisions you make are not for you, but for the faces yet to come.’ ”
ABOVE: Tribute to the Mohawk Ironworkers, fabric and beads, 4 x 5 feet.
SHOWS: NMAI Art Market, December 3 – 4, 2011, New York, 212.514.3700, www.nmai.si.edu. Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market, March 3 – 4, 2012, Phoenix, 602.252.8848, www.heard.org.
EXHIBIT: Iroquois Artistic Visions: From Sky World to Turtle Island, through December 31, 2011, Iroquois Indian Museum, Howes Cave, New York, 518.296.8949, www.iroquoismuseum.org.
