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Fractured Blocks - 27 1/2" W X 35 1/2" H ($500)


This quilt was an early attempt to break away from traditional patterns, the cutting of fabric evenly and with obsessive straight-line precision. I started with a squarish shape in the center and built each block up individually, taking great pains to select fabrics which electrified or conflicted visually with the previous fabric. Some of the fabrics date back decades, include one, which is literally over 100 years old and is held together with the carefully wrought stitches I put in it to keep it whole. The piece of fabric was a gift from a friend, now long dead, who researched the history of the American textile industry. Fabric is durable and sturdy, but also fragile and delicate and I acknowledge that tension in these blocks. The black border acts as a kind of windowpane sectioning and each block glows with its own personal intensity, held in check by the perfect geometry of those straight black lines.

Designed, Nonlinear Cutting, Machine Pieced, Hand Quilted

Karen Nuzzo

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