These African American quilts did more than keep people warm. They told stories.
Vanessa H. Larson, The Washington Post
October 2026
[…] The exhibition draws from a bequest to the Berkeley museum from Eli Leon, who amassed a 3,000-strong collection of African American quilts, with an emphasis on improvisational abstraction. Leon’s collection is complemented by work from contemporary Bay Area artists, including Clay, who are taking quiltmaking in more representational and figurative directions. Unlike the quilts of Gee’s Bend — an African American community in Alabama that has been acclaimed for its quiltwork for many years — those displayed in Routed West tell a different story, one of maintaining the practice over great distances and time amid the trajectories of migration. A map shows the quiltmakers’ Southern birthplaces and where they ended up in the West. […]