The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of March 29, 2024

Cumulo

Cumulo

2014
(American, b. 1970)
Overall: 182.8 x 189.2 cm (71 15/16 x 74 1/2 in.)
© Sanford Biggers
Location: not on view

Did You Know?

Using spray paint in this work, the artist adds imagery to historic quilts.

Description

Inspired by research indicating that quilts may have been used as coded signposts along the Underground Railroad, Sanford Biggers began employing them as his canvases. Gold paint and the inclusion of a heavenly body—a cumulus cloud—elevate the status of this quilt, and the women who crafted them, from mundane to sacred. Historically, quilts were often made from fabric scraps by enslaved women. They served as both a conduit for creativity and a way to beautify spaces. “I consider myself a late collaborator,” Biggers states, “working with this patchwork that goes over a span of decades and generations.”
  • 2015
    Agnes Gund, New York, NY, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2015–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • "Currents and Constellations.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 61, no. 4 (Fall 2021): 23. Reproduced and Mentioned: P. 23
  • Currents and Constellations: Black Art in Focus. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 20-June 26, 2022).
  • {{cite web|title=Cumulo|url=false|author=Sanford Biggers|year=2014|access-date=29 March 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2015.82