Quilt National was established in 1979 to "provide an exhibit opportunity to artists whose work was unwelcome by the organizers of the existing quilt shows". It may seem weird now that innovation was unwanted in the established quilt world, given the exciting influence quilters working "out of the box" have had on both quilt design and the status of quilting as an artform. But in the 1970s, when the revival of interest in handmade objects, and thus quilting, took off, the work of innovative quilters such as Nancy Crow was indeed considered "deviant". Quilts were supposed to be functional and made using traditional designs. As difficult as this was for the art quilters of that time, we would otherwise not have Quilt National come around every two years to challenge and inspire us.
How are the quilts selected? Entrants send in a slide of their quilt, which are all viewed by the judges. The poor-quality slides are eliminated first -- no matter how magnificent your quilt may be, if the photo of it is poor, it hasn't a chance. Similarly if it shows a background or includes the hand of someone holding the quilt.
Only one quilt per artist is included, so all the entrants from one quilter are viewed together and one chosen as representative. It's worth noting that where an artist's quilts are strongly related, it's assumed that this is the artist's own developed style, and where the quilts are very different from each other, it's assumed there are spin-offs from disparate sources. Derivative works "were not considered". Instead the jurors were looking for "the personal voice ... unusual designs, ideas, and materials".
The judges then go through round after round of scoring the slides, eliminating the lowest scorers from each round. Eventually the final selection is reached. And what a selection it is too. You may not agree with the judges' choice of winning quilts, but you will agree that these are indeed some of the world's "best contemporary quilts". Each has a page to itself in this book, with a large colour photo, the title of the quilt, materials and construction method used, the artist's name and town of residence, plus the short artist's statement about the quilt. The printing standard in this book is extremely high, with the colours of the quilts vibrantly reproduced.
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