Lost Quilt Come Home

The Bluest Eye by Susan Brubaker Knapp

Susan Brubaker Knapp needed help recovering her quilt, “The Bluest Eye.” It was last seen in December 2008 in Chicago, Illinois. The quilt had been on display at Obama’s Columbus, Ohio headquarters for most of 2008. In December it was shipped back to Susan, but to the wrong address. The shipping company returned it to the sender, but it never arrived.

In February 2009, Susan reported the quilt was found and returned safely. It had been returned to the sender due to an incorrect zip code, and the sender’s husband received it, but neglected to tell his wife. Thankfully, the quilt was recovered and immediately shipped to the correct address.

“The Bluest Eye” is 12″ by 12″ and was made in 2007. It is an original design incorporating batiks and hand-dyed cottons. It is machine pieced, machine appliqued, threadpainted, and machine quilted. The quilt has a label on the back with the quilt name and Susan’s name.

Susan designed this quilt for the 2008 Quilting Arts magazine calendar competion. It was a finalist in the competition, and was given a Judges Choice award. It also appeared in the August/September 2007 issue of Quilting Arts magazine. Susan writes, “The competition had the theme ‘A Novel Idea,’ and artists were asked to create quilts about their favorite books. Mine is based on Toni Morrison’s novel about an African-American girl growing up in horrible violence, her descent into madness, and her dream to have blue eyes like Shirley Temple so she would be accepted and loved. For this piece, I sketched the eye from photos I had taken of my blue-eyed daughter and of one of her African-American classmates. I made patterns from the sketch, then fused hundreds of small pieces of fabric down and heavily thread painted it before quilting.”