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Jean Ray Laury 1956 - 1975
Quilt Artist, Designer, Author

Life and Career Highlights 1956 - 1975

Jean Ray Laury, an academically trained artist and designer, was one of the first fine artists to move to quilting as a medium of choice in the late 1950s. Her quilts followed neither traditional method nor pattern; they were bold, modern, colorful collages, often laced with humor and satire. Laury has been called a “foremother of a quilt revival”, and “one of the pioneers” of non-traditional quilts.

Early Life and Education:

Laury was born in 1928 in Doon, Iowa. She was the second of four girls. The family moved to Oak Ridge, Tennessee where she graduated from high school. Laury returned to Iowa to attend Iowa State Teachers’ College (now Iowa Northern University) where she majored in art and education, graduating in 1950. After teaching art for several years, she moved to California, married and had a son. Laury earned her Master’s Degree in Design from Stanford University in 1956.

Laury began quilting as part of her Master’s degree project. (Hall-Patton 66) This quilt was an appliqué quilt for her son, Tom. It was filled with images familiar to children, but Laury interpreted them in a simplified contemporary style. (Ramsey 23) Tom’s Quilt was included in a student exhibition at the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco, and led to a solo exhibition there several years later. (Ramsey 23)

Laury entered her first quilt in the 1958 Eastern States Exposition in Storrowton Village in Springfield, Massachusetts, although it did not win any prizes, it attracted the attention of Roxa Wright, one of the jurors and creative editor at House Beautiful magazine. (Hall-Patton 66) Through her, Laury got commissions for designing quilts for magazine projects, and later followed her to Woman’s Day. (Hall-Patton 66) Jean’s designs were included in Better Homes and Gardens, Family Circle, Cosmopolitan, Needle and Craft, and may other publications. (Ramsey 23)

Role in Empowering Women:

With encouragement from Roxa Wright, Laury began work on her first book, Appliqué Stitchery, published in 1966. (Ramsey 24)The book “covered techniques and ideas not covered elsewhere.” (Ramsey 24) Laury’s second book, Quilts and Coverlets: A Contemporary Approach was published in 1970. These first two books “framed needlework as a conscious effort against standardization.” (Patton-Hall 66) In her books, Laury emphasized the ability as well as the need of women to individualize their homes and make them less a product of mass production.(Hall-Patton 67)

Laury was “at the leading edge of a tidal wave of feminist art…in the early 1970s.” (Sider 56) Her attitude was non confrontational, yet her encouragement of women’s work was as effective as that of more politicized teachers. (Sider 56)

She used the cultural values of quilts as a means of personal expression, “Quilts provide a lovely, fragile and personal kind of silent, visual communication from one generation to others.” (Laury 11) Quilts are a form of social statement and a way of creating generational continuity - this idea of creating historical female continuity was significant to the Women’s Movement of the 1960s. (Hall-Patton 71)

Laury did not stray from the traditional ideal of family with “bread winner father, stay-at-home wife, and kids who were the woman’s responsibility to raise.” (Hall-Patton 67) During the 1960s this arrangement was still the norm, and these women were Laury’s primary audience for books, magazine articles and designs. (Hall-Patton 68) By identifying herself as an average mother and housewife, Laury offered her own path to creativity and art making as a model for other women to follow. (Hall-Patton 68) Laury encouraged and empowered women to be creative, in her book, Quilts and Coverlets, she states, “Original design is not beyond the capacity of any homemaker or student or quilt maker.” (Laury 12)

Influence on Art Quilt movement:

Laury was the “most significant forerunner of this revolutionary movement among quilts artists, when quilts began to be viewed as contemporary art.” (Sider 55). Laury stated in the introduction to Appliqué Stitchery that “art has less to do with the material used than with the perceptive and expressive abilities of the individual. Any difference between the ‘fine’ and the ‘decorative’ arts is not a matter of material, but rather what the artist brings to the material. Any media may successfully be used at any level for any purpose.” (Sider 57)

Quilt artist Sue Pierce said of Laury: “She was one of the first people publicly to champion the fact that fiber creations that had commonly been know as ‘women’s work’ should be seen as serious art expression.” (Sider 55) Laury is considered early critic of the idea that women’s traditional art is considered a “secondary status”. (Hall-Patton 73) Passion and great visual aspects that typify basic art principles were what made a great quilt to Laury, and she combined traditional elements with personal statements in her work. (Hall-Patton 73) By equalizing various art mediums, she sought to encourage women to view their work as art. (Hall-Patton 73)

Publications during this time period: (QuiltStudy.org)

1966: Applique Stitchery

1970: Quilts and Coverlets: A Contemporary Approach

1970: Doll Making: A Creative Approach

1971: Handmade Rugs From Practically Anything

1973: Creative Body Coverings

1973: Wood Applique

1974: New Uses fro Old Laces: How to Recycle Flea Market and Attic Finds

1975: Handmade Toys and Games: A Guide to Creating Your Own

Exhibitions during this time period: (Ramsey 23-24)

DeYoung Museum, San Francisco (student exhibition)

Eastern States Exposition at Storrowton Village, Springfield, Massachusetts, 1958

American Crayon Company, New York, 1962

Crocker Art Gallery, Sacramento, CA 1963 - solo

Museum of Contemporary Crafts

California Design Exhibitions 8, 9 and 10 (1962, ’65 and ’68) (Bavor 73)

External Links: