Step into the world of quilting with Of Salt and Spirit: Black Quilters in the American South, on view November 16, 2024 – May 18, 2025. Over the past twenty years, MMA has amassed one of the largest quilt collections in the American South. This exhibition will feature over 50 handmade and machine-stitched quilts from MMA’s permanent collection, including Crossroads Quilters, Gwendolyn Magee, and several collected by American photographer Roland L. Freeman on his travels, recently acquired by MMA in 2022.
Curator Dr. Sharbreon Plummer combines thorough research, innovative interpretation, and community engagement to form a cohesive, experiential study of American art through a Black feminist lens. The exhibition and the accompanying publication seek to illuminate the processes and practices of Black Southern quilters and demystify cultural narratives assigned to their artistry while celebrating the enduring impact of quilting on communities and generations. Join us on a journey of discovery and appreciation, where every stitch tells a story of resilience, creativity, and cultural identity.
Of Salt and Spirit: Black Quilters in the American South, a presentation in the Myra Green and Lynn Green Root Memorial Exhibition Series, is presented with support from Henry Luce Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, Art Dealers Association of America Foundation, Visit Mississippi, and Visit Jackson.
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About Roland Freeman
Roland L. Freeman (1936-2023) worked as a stringer for Time magazine and Magnum Photos, including a stint as a White House photographer. During Freeman’s travels through the American South and as director of the Mississippi Folklife Project, he began photographing and documenting African-American quilters and guilds. His interest in craft traditions informed his collection long before others took note of this distinctive but little-recognized artistic tradition.
During his life, Freeman amassed more than 120 quilts and created several of his original own designs. In 1979, he published Something to Keep You Warm: The Roland Freeman Collection of Black American Quilts from the Mississippi Heartland, the first book about quilts made by African Americans, and curated the related national touring exhibition, the first of its kind. As Freeman’s appreciation for the milieu grew, his documentation project evolved and expanded. Freeman came to realize quilts were far more than “just something to keep you warm.” A Communion of the Spirits: African American Quilters, Preservers, and Their Stories, his second book published in 1996, Freeman expressed his belief that quilts are magical, stating, “Quilts have the power to create a virtual web of connections—individual, generational, professional, physical, spiritual, cultural, and historical.” In 1997, MMA presented an exhibition accompanying A Communion of the Spirits that toured nationally.
Many of the 131 quilts gifted to MMA were made in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and other Southern states, as well as international locations such as Liberia and South Africa. Several are by quilters in MMA’s permanent collection, including Annie Dennis, Crossroads Quilters, and Hystercine Rankin. Thirteen of Freeman’s photographs are also in MMA’s permanent collection.
About the Curator
Sharbreon Plummer, PhD, is an independent researcher, curator, and writer with fifteen years of experience in the arts and culture sector. Her research focuses on textile traditions, artistic production, and folkways connected to Black life, especially within the South. She has facilitated and presented work at institutions such as Project Row Houses, the African American Museum in Philadelphia, Rhode Island School of Design, Americans for the Arts, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Princeton University and several others.
A few of her creative projects include her internationally distributed zine Diasporic Threads: Black Women, Fibre and Textiles (2022) and The People’s Quilting Bee (2023-24), an international public humanities course and quilting circle co-founded with Dr. Jess Bailey. She has also been featured as an artist-in-residence at Rogers Art Loft and Arquetopia. Dr. Plummer has organized shows such as Stitching Abolition (2022) and Mirrored Migration (2017), and is the author of Black Quilts: Memory, Methods and Medicine (Chronicle Books, 2026). Dr. Plummer is also an active contributor to Quiltfolk Magazine and serves as the editor of Uncoverings, the flagship research journal of the American Quilt Study Group. She completed her Ph.D. in Arts Administration, Education and Policy at The Ohio State University.
MMA’s New Audio Guide
Explore the exhibition via audio with Bloomberg Connects, the free arts and culture app.
Don’t forget to bring your headphones!
