Amazing Wonders- Quilts by African Americans Exhibit (Feature: Avis Collins Robinson)

Avis Collins Robinson’s’ “Sharecroppers Masterpiece”

The current exhibition event at UC Davis’ Nelson gallery features textile patchwork quilt works created by African Americans from the late 19th century to 2009. The majority of these quilts feature patterns and repetition used in a way to give a pleasant optic impression on the viewer. In Robinson’s’ “Sharecroppers Masterpiece” she uses the unifying theme of warm pinks, violets and reds to unify the colors and uses repetition and pattern to please our minds by creating a uniform even appearance that our minds enjoy. Parallel to her "Crazy Pockets” (2008) work, Robinson employs the use of a few gestalt principles. The predominant one of these works is of similarity- alternating orientations of vertical and horizontal stripes in a grid checkerboard pattern, and with even scale and proportion relative to the other sections, Robinson gives these quilts a visual focus that spreads across the whole quilt evenly. This deviates from her other quilts, like “Annie’s Blue Jeans” (2007) which is a central square pattern that repeats continuously until the edge of the quilt. It is because all the squares emanate from the central square, so our eye is automatically drawn to the origin/center and from there our eye wanders from that central point. Another noteworthy point to Robinson’s works is her re-use of material of old blue denim jeans. (Crazy Pockets and Annie’s Blue Jeans) Rather than dispose of old tattered jeans, Robinson is another artist who perpetuates the theme of “going green” that is seen in recent artists and their artwork.