A new exhibition displaying quilts as textile art and highlighting a burgeoning cohort of queer artmakers opens at Harold Washington Library Center on October 25, 2026. A Quilt Is a Poem That We Say Again: queer quilting Chicago features over 30 pieces made by local artists.
Curator's statement:
queer quilting is a workshop series and a growing community collective. Organized by teaching artist Eliza Fernand, and generated by the few hundred quilt-curious queers who have attended workshops over the past four years, it is a ritual and a point of entry into creative practice, release and connection. The quilts in this exhibition demonstrate the range of techniques and ideas that each quilter brings to the conversation. Improvising, following patterns, incorporating text and politics and pleasure and play; attempting a composition that, bound in stitches, becomes a measure of achievement. Repetition and rhyme, and maybe reason or maybe not, are the ingredients we cast our spells with as we make our quilts into something we can stand behind, something we can rest on in repose.
A Quilt Is a Poem That We Say Again: queer quilting Chicago opens at Harold Washington Library Center on October 25, 2026 and will be on view through January 11, 2027 in the Ida B. Wells Corridor.
Program Dates & Locations:
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A Quilt is a Poem That We Say Again: Opening Reception
Harold Washington Library Center, First Floor Grand Lobby | Sunday, October 25, 2026 at 1:30 p.m. -
A Quilt is a Poem That We Say Again: Teen Quilting
Harold Washington Library Center, YOUMedia | Monday, November 9, 2026 at 4 p.m. -
A Quilt is a Poem That We Say Again: Panel Discussion
Harold Washington Library Center, Video Theater | Monday, November 16, 2026 at 5:30 p.m. -
A Quilt is a Poem That We Say Again: Closing Reception
Harold Washington Library Center, First Floor Grand Lobby | Thursday, January 7, 2027 at 5:30 p.m.