When I was given the Titanic quilt for my blog post, I was, at first, excited. But then I realised what a vast topic it was. There must be few who do not know the story of the night of 14th April, 1912, in which nearly 1500 lives ( no-one can be sure how many actually boarded) were lost in an icy, dark sea, far from land and home, in the sinking of the “unsinkable” Titanic on her maiden voyage.
Initially I looked for inspiration at the poignant memories, such as the telegrams, the survivors’ testimony, the stories of both heroism and tragedy along with the well-known images. But the magnificent arrogance of the “ world’s biggest” liner together with the deep tragedy of so many lives cut short meant I could not do it justice from this point of view. So I turned to the stunning contemporary art deco posters of ocean liners for my inspiration. And I decided to portray the magnificent, doomed, man-built ship against the even more magnificent backdrop of one of nature’s oldest and biggest destroyers-an iceberg.
As we were in isolation, I could not go shopping for fabric, so I searched my stash! Out came a lively black art deco wave pattern, soon to be discarded as too regular for the flat calm of the Atlantic Ocean. And I needed a limited palette, so could not let any fabric dominate. I was reluctant to foundation piece it, as I felt the frequent seams, though they would add to the iceberg, would take away from the focal point of the ship. So I settled on a complete mixture of patchwork, applique, and foundation piecing.
I felt it needed a limited palette, both to showcase the biggest ship in the world, as it was at the time, and to contrast with the stark cold of the ice field on that bitter cold Atlantic night. So I found a deep blue patterned fabric which suggested the depths of the sea, and used plain fabrics for everything else except the shadows of the icebergs. For these, I had to use patterned fabrics to get the colours I needed, though one was used on the reverse.
A2 was the smallest size I could make, without minimising the ice or trivialising the doomed liner. And I really needed to add the human link of that last, desperate wireless message, so I gave it a “telegram” feel with embroidered words. Making the quilt reminded me all over again of the stories of the people who were faced with the impossible choice, and who gave up their chance of life for others, of the women who refused to leave their husbands, of the men who stood back to let the women and children go first, of all those lives changed forever. Qualities we would all like to hope that we have, but I, for one, hope I will never be asked to prove.
Fantastic piece Maggie. It really represents the gigantic nature of the catastrophe and the last desperate wireless message was a really interesting detail to add. Love it.
Thank you!