Indigo and the Art of Quiltmaking

Explore the world’s fascination with the color blue. This exhibition presents twenty quilts created between the early 1800s and 2015 of fabric in shades ranging from pale sky to inky midnight. These dreamy blue hues come from indigo, an ancient pigment made from the leaves of plants in the genus Indigofera. Most natural dyes fade away relatively quickly, but indigo is colorfast—it may lighten over time but always remains blue. For thousands of years, people around the world have treasured textiles dyed with indigo. A synthetic version, developed in the 1880s, still colors today’s blue jeans. The quilts on view showcase a range of indigo dyeing techniques as well as the skill, design sensibility, and artistry of the women who made them. Indigo and the Art of Quiltmaking is organized by the International Quilt Museum, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, home to the largest public collection of quilts in the world.