"Alabama Soil" Quilt by Sylvia G. Stephens, 2008

Donated to the Alabama State Council on the Arts

Photograph by Sylvia G. Stephens

The Artist

Sylvia G. Stephens is dedicated to the folk art programs and traditions in Alabama.  She served on the Board of Directors for the Alabama Folklife Association and completed the Community Scholars Institute.  She has conducted fieldwork on foodways and helped direct and manage AFA events.  As a recipient of the Alabama State Council on the Arts, Folk Arts Apprenticeship, she learned quilting from her mother, Mozell Benson, a 2001 National Heritage Fellow, National Endowment for the Arts.    In the book Carry On, Stephens states, "while studying with Mom, I have come to understand how quilting has served both the need to provide warm covers for the family beds and also a creative form of expression using fabrics."

The Quilt

Inspired by a photograph of the official Alabama Soil, the center block of the quilt is an appliqué made of fabrics sewn to a foundation piece of fabric that is subsequently cut into the shape of the state of Alabama.  Pieces of the same fabrics that form the appliquéd state shape are used to frame the center block and complete the quilt top.

For more details and information you can visit the attached file.