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Connecticut Needlework: Women, Art, and Family, 1740-1840

Collection Info
Gift of Newton C. Brainard, 1962.28.4  Photograph by Gavin Ashworth. © 2009 The Connecticut His…

Twenty years before what has been traditionally accepted as the beginning of two-dimensional pictorial art in Connecticut (William Johnston's portrait painting in the region in 1762), talented and skillful Connecticut women were creating pictures on canvas-assembling color, line, form, and symbols into visual compositions intended for display. These women's canvases, in contrast to those typically considered by art historians, used needles instead of brushes, and multicolored threads instead of paint.

Some types of needlework are primarily associated with Connecticut - even distinctive to Connecticut - such as bed rugs, quilted petticoats with figural designs, and the use of crewel embroidery on women's dresses. But whatever the end product, Connecticut needlewomen created a broad range of aesthetically pleasing figural and decorative art that was displayed within private homes or worn on personal occasions. This exhibition makes public a variety of work that affirms the fundamental role that female Connecticut needleworkers played in the development of the visual arts of early America.

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Gift of Hannah Whittlesey, 1840.7.1a,b  Photograph by Gavin Ashworth.  © 2009 The Connecticut H…
Hannah Edwards
about 1746
Gift of Mrs. William Talcott, 1844.21.0  Photograph by Gavin Ashworth.  © 2009 The Connecticut …
Priscilla Kingsbury
1770-1790
Gift  of Rebecca and Cornelia Butler, 1859.9.0  Photograph by Gavin Ashworth.  © 2009 The Conne…
Mary Pierpont
about 1730-1740
Gift of Hezekiah L. Hosmer, 1859.18.2  Photograph by David Stansbury.  © 2010 The Connecticut H…
Lucy Spalding
1793
Connecticut Historical Society collection, 1904.5.0  Photograph by David Stansbury.  © 2009 The…
Lydia Church
1791
Sampler
Sarah Lawrence
1791
Gift of Jane Tuttle, 1923.9.0  Photograph by Windsor Conservation © 2012 The Connecticut Histor…
Frederic William Tuttle
1821
Bequest of Frederick Jabez Huntington, 1925.1.3  Photograph by David Stansbury © 2012 Connectic…
Faith Trumbull
1761
Gift of Jane W. Stone, 1935.10.1  Photograph by David Stansbury.  © 2009 The Connecticut Histor…
Jerusha Pitkin
about 1750-1755