Art and About – Archive

A friend sent me the web link to a picture of a quilt entitled “Ground Zero,” conceived of and created by a woman shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The quilters name is Lois Jarvis of Madison, Wisconsin. Her memorial to those who died is so powerful that no matter how often I look at the image of the quilt, I feel like someone just punched me in the chest and the tears start pooling in my eyes. If you’re sitting near a computer, go see for yourself right now, http://www.gzquilt.com/About_the_Quilt/about_the_quilt.html.

This is one of the cases where a thousand words can’t do the picture justice, but I’ll try. Jarvis used a Lone Star pattern comprised of over 700 diamonds to look like an explosion blasting out from an epicenter. On each diamond, she printed the face of someone who died on September 11, using photos she downloaded from CNN shortly after the tragedy. Bordering the blast are panels of gray to represent the smoke, the dust and the sorrow. It sounds too simplistic when I describe it here. Please go look at it for yourself.

In her artist’s statement, Jarvis writes, “I am not as eloquent with words as some people are. And why I needed to make this quilt I could not say. I do not personally know anyone who perished that day. I don’t plan to sell this quilt. So why I made it is a mystery to me. All I can say is that I felt I should do it because I knew I could do it.”

Jarvis’ written statement strikes me almost as profoundly as her quilted one.

Ms. Jarvis, it is no mystery to me why you made this quilt. You do not need words when you have been granted the language of imagery.
I am fortunate to have a job where I get to hang out with visual artists, and one apology regularly comes up in conversation when I try to talk to them: “Sorry, I’m not very good with words.”

Since I am a word-based life form, I always have to chuckle to myself when I hear this and contemplate replying, “Sorry, I’m not very good with images.” When I see what an artist such as Jarvis can create without words, I feel hopelessly inadequate. I can ramble on and on and never capture the emotional pit this country was shoved into on September 11. With even the fastest glance at “Ground Zero,” I can instantly be taken back to my emotions of that day. I am in awe of anyone with that ability to communicate, and I am sorry that anyone in the visual realm feels they have to apologize for not being able to deliver a snappy sound bite or newspaper quote. I am sorry that we live in a society where one’s glibness is a measure of communicative worth. I am relieved that not everyone can or wants to bubble over in verbiage. It gives my ears a periodic rest and my eyes something far more interesting to rest upon than reams of black type on white paper.

I wonder how many of the 2996 people who died on September 11 ever apologized for the talents they did not have. I wonder how many embraced the talents they did have and were mindful that the world would be a boring place if we were all the same. I wonder how many were thankful that human begins are blessed with the astounding gift of creative expression. I hope the spirits of everyone, living and dead, find peace with the voice they are given.