5/06/26 - VIRTUAL THREAD Talk - Maritza Soto - 8-9pm
What are THREAD talks?
THREAD talks is a virtual lecture series featuring a new guest speaker each month.
Lectures are live at 8pm Eastern time on the first Wednesday of each month, and cover all sorts of topics of interest to quilters and makers.
Each lecture is $35, or you can join Club Gotham to get a year's worth of THREAD talks for just $125!
THREAD talk lectures are included with a Club Gotham membership. Club members, add the lecture to your cart while logged into your account to get the automatic discount. You must register for each lecture you are interested in to receive the link to watch.
Are you a Club Gotham member?
THREAD talk lectures are included with you Club Gotham membership.
To register, add the lecture to your cart while logged into your account. When you reach the checkout page, your Club discount will be applied.
You must register for each lecture you are interested in to receive the link to watch.
This lecture will take place virtually over Zoom. Once you register, you will receive an email with instructions for logging in. All Talks are in Eastern (NYC) time. Talk will not be recorded.
Gotham Quilts is committed to making our events accessible to everyone. If you have any questions about access or to request any reasonable accommodations that will facilitate your full participation in this event, please contact us at US@gothamquilts.com . If you require an accommodation or service to fully participate, please contact us at least 3 days prior to the event.
Improv Throughout Time
Improvisational piecing has been around for as long a quilting has existed. However, when we talk about the history of quilting, improv as an approach is often excluded from the discussion. The intentionality behind perfectly imperfect works is rarely discussed in favor of technically masterful works, overlooking the amount of mastery that goes into these less prototypical, “traditional” quilts. I
n this lecture, we will take a look back at some of the earliest examples of improv and explore how this approach has developed over the last 200 or so years. We will talk about how the visual language has changed and what commonalities run through these works from different places and times.
Some of the artists discussed will be earlier anonymous Welsh and Amish works, Harriet Powers, the Gees Bend Quilters, Molly Upton, Sherri Lynn Wood, and Jennifer Candon, among others.
Meet Maritza Soto
Born and raised in Queens, New York, Maritza comes from a family of makers. She has a BFA in Illustration from Parsons School of Design. In 2008, Maritza started making quilts. Her quilts have been exhibited at The International Quilt Festival, QuiltCon, and the International Quilt Museum. Her quilt “Go North” won the Freespirit Award for Quilting Excellence at QuiltCon 2017. Her quilts have appeared in “Quilting With a Modern Slant” and “Modern Quilts: Designs of the New Century.” Currently, Maritza resides in Cambridge, MA, where she taught quilting at Gather Here for 10 years.