October Monthly Meeting: Mary Fons

Guest Lecturer: Mary Fons

Doors open at 6:00pm; meeting begins at 6:45pm.

We Need To Talk About Bertha (The Greatest Quilt Treasure Hunt of All Time) 

Few stories in American quilt history are as captivating as that of Bertha Amelia Meckstroth  (b.1875-1960). From roughly 1930-50, Meckstroth created 180 iconoclastic quilts she called her “sculptures in cloth,” arguably the original art quilts. Extraordinarily beautiful and utterly original,these silk and cotton masterpieces featured reverse applique, trapunto, and flawlessly executed quilting, and often included text and strange iconography (such as bats and spiderwebs.) But Meckstroth’s life was both triumph and tragedy: In her will, she stated her remaining 89 works be kept together after her death and she had saved $70,000 to aid in their stewardship. Without an executor, however, her will was ignored. Meckstroth’s life’s work was scattered to the wind. In this must-see lecture, Mary Fons shares her extraordinary findings after two years of deep research into this fascinating story, including new biographical information on Meckstroth from primary sources; never-before-seen written and photographic documentation, and — you guessed it — the locations of a number of the missing quilts. We Need To Talk About Bertha received a standing ovation from the sold-out crowd at QuiltCon 2024.