{"id":43808,"date":"2021-09-29T14:00:20","date_gmt":"2021-09-29T19:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/?p=43808"},"modified":"2021-09-29T21:19:17","modified_gmt":"2021-09-30T02:19:17","slug":"erl-aap-rocky-met-gala-quilt-yo-dig-gitty-the-final-break-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/the-bomb\/2021\/09\/29\/erl-aap-rocky-met-gala-quilt-yo-dig-gitty-the-final-break-down\/","title":{"rendered":"~ERL \/ A$AP Rocky \/ MET GALA QUILT \/ YO, DIG-GITTY !!! THE FINAL BREAK-DOWN !!!"},"content":{"rendered":"

OK, SO HERE’S THE FINAL<\/strong> GONNA-BREAK-IT-DOWN \/ YO, DIG-GITTY !!!
\nART LOVERS TAKE \/ ON . . . THAT SLIGHTLY RAW, WILD, YET MUTED MULTI-COLOR, TINY FLOWER DANCING PRINT – GLOBAL-AUDIENCE-REACHING \/ HISTORY-MAKING \/ MET-SHAKING \/ JUST AWESOME !!! VINTAGE THRIFT SHOP \/ PROBABLY BARGAIN BIN FIND !!!
\nAMERICAN AS PIE DIY, AS LOW-FI AS THEY GET, EVEN SLIGHTLY SEEDY, BUT TURNS OUT TO BE – FASHION NIGHT’S KNOCK-OUT LOOK – AMONGST A SEA OF CONTENDERS & SOME EVEN BASICALLY NUDE \/ THIS ERL \/ A$AP Rocky – MET GALA QUILT- DRAPED ON THE SHOULDERS OF A RAPPER WITH THE CUTEST SMILE & HAIR – SWEPT BY & JUST CAUGHT THE ETHOS, & TOOK . . . SAIL. LIKE A CHILD’S LULLABY.<\/p>\n

SOOTHING EACH & EVERY ONE OF US, WITH ITS NEWFOUND RECOGNITION, AND HOPEFUL SWAGGER. <\/p>\n

just ONE word ‘wraps’ – it up, and . . .
\nthat word – would be: ‘VERNACULAR’. <\/p>\n

up from the streets \/ just like the amazing creative \/ artist \/ musician who wore it. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nA$AP Rocky in his ERL \/ found vintage ‘Puff’ quilt \/ at the recent MET FASHION GALA.
\nimage via Instagram @highsnobity<\/a><\/p>\n

if you refer to it just as a ‘quilt’ \/ as everyone from the ERL founder himself, to the Brooklyn artisan guy who got to repair it, and make a custom backing – with which to (garment) line it, to the entire media talking heads who covered it, but who don’t know a knitting needle – from a crochet hook, let alone a specific quilt ‘genre’, \/ and, just call it: ‘magic’, you are so<\/strong> missing the point.<\/p>\n

this quilt was, just simply put: the runt of the quilt-making lexicon \/ the runt of the litter . . it was highly unlikely to have set foot in the MET, let alone a Folk Art Museum, unless said venue had a small niche for . . lowly ‘arts & crafts’ & family projects, of yore.
\nI mean maybe eventually, like in a hundred years. and then, just out of curiosity, and for the record.<\/p>\n

talk about . . . vernacular \/ folk art, and hobby – all in one ‘loser’ breath.<\/p>\n

this quilt was:<\/p>\n

~most likely,’Appalachian’ basement – DIY !!! I haven’t seen any up here in the North East (?).
\n~btw ‘Appalachian’ said here, with a great deal of respect. early mountain quilting, is quite renown \/ those old timers have an amazing legacy – that goes way back. they were mostly focused, just eking out a subsistence living . . providing, originally \/ all hand-stitched functional, utilitarian \/ farm quilts, for their neighbors. with young children helping out, starting in early, learning the skills.
\nbut, with a rich individuality & great, great needle skill, much like their country music. ditto children learning.
\n~but these ‘Puff’ quits were by the 1970s \/ with the advent of factory-made bed covers \/ Mother-&-young-kids craft \/ family project – DIY !!!
\n~these ‘Puff’, or ‘Biscuit’, or even ‘Bubble’ quilts – had become by this time \/ more of a ‘hobby’ project \/ the old skills & patience, and time, need \/ had been lost. it was all about cutting out simple square shapes, sewing them together on 3 sides, followed by the super easy fun of ‘stuffing’ – the resultant ‘Puff’ pocket, and then simply assembling the over-all grid.
\n-following a straight-forward ‘template’, that indeed we can see here, in this ERL \/ A$AP Rocky quilt. ~probably straight out of the pages of your average ‘Womens Craft Magazine’, found monthly in the supermarket aisle.
\n~a template quilt. to be followed. and strung together, and not deviated from much.
\n~if you look into blogs on the web, writers recall working on them, with their mothers, and sisters, stuffing the ‘puffs’ – with old pantyhose. busy, and happy.
\n~yet they were mostly successful as ‘projects’ \/ they were not really comfortable, let alone snuggly, truth be told. too heavy. too bulky. too stiff. too much fabric.
\n~today they are mostly made as small baby ‘rugs’, gentle things babies can be placed on, where they can roll around a bit, but not too much, among the gentle cushioned pockets, but also not get – too far off.
\n~but back, to the older full sized ones \/ their lumpy fate was finally, to be, not even wanted \/ even as low-fi ‘hobby’ quilts \/ they got no respect – and after a generation or so, families were happy to discard, or ‘donate’ them to thrift shops, which in turn dumped them into the $1 bin.
\n~I doubt if Eli Russell Linnetz paid even, much more than $3.50 \/ for his ‘Puff’ quilt, in which he was to find so much delight & new inspiration, and the resultant recognition.
\nsometimes, it just takes another person’s genius \/ and . . vision. sometimes it just takes a talented person – from another cultural background, to see the truth in our own eccentricities. <\/p>\n

yet, this was to be the beginning of the new – American Quilt revival !!<\/p>\n

interest in everything DIY, hand-made free-will expressive, or simply decorative \/ and yet functional, sparked after Woodstock, after the 60s . . . after ‘The Age of Aquarius’ !!
\nand, there was no going back. and, to prove it \/
\nwe have quite the DIY culture today, don’t we. from Granny Squares, to BODE, and back.
\ninterest in all things DIY, hand-made & functional, yet individually expressive – have made made a tremendous renaissance. <\/p>\n

this ERL \/ A$AP Rocky Met Gala quilt was at – that very tipping point. <\/p>\n

there’s . . the magic.<\/p>\n

and, yet for all its humble origins,
\nwhen A$AP Rocky sashayed down that Met Gala red carpet, on Rhianna’s arm, draped in this almost ‘generic’ mass of . . cheerful, craft project color, with the big 3-D puffy pockets, like nothing so much as . . . big textile ‘Chinese dumplings’ – everybody, but everybody caught . . the vibe. <\/p>\n

A sense of warmth \/ an emotional support – that would \/ could envelop you, soothe, empower, and protect you. all in a great big bubble – of gentle \/ popping fun.
\nit was all about the industrious, thrifty voices of our proud American past – a rallying call to arms \/ our<\/strong> kind of arms – the ‘creatives’ ones.<\/p>\n

afterward:<\/strong><\/p>\n

in fact I was<\/strong> going to title this little essay:
\n‘AGE Of AQUARIUS, not’
\nvs.
\n‘Age of VERNACULAR, yes’.<\/p>\n

but luckily, I decided maybe I had better look it up first \/ see what ‘cosmic’ era, this is anyway ? <\/p>\n

& GUESS WHAT . . . . EVERY-BODY !!!!
\nROCK – YOUR BODY !!!<\/p>\n

WE ARE<\/strong> . . . APPARENTLY, JUST ENTERING – A NEW<\/strong> AGE of AQUARIUS !!!!
\nSO, SURPRISE, SURPRISE, not !!
\nit seems we are to be in a hopeful cosmic vernacular ‘corridor’.
\nthat the ‘vernacular’ \/ up from the streets \/ self-taught, and driven from with-in, and in turn \/ from within our wider community, propelled by a strong creative drive \/ will rule. <\/p>\n

it’s also supposedly hitting real hard, real, <\/strong> real, super powerful hard \/ because they say this ‘2021 Age of Aquarius’ is super rare \/ as it involves \/ a meeting of 2 STRONG PLANETS, specifically: “a great COSMIC conjunction of Jupiter & Saturn” \/ that only comes round – every 800 years.”<\/p>\n

so, yeah. magic. might be the word that comes to mind. as in a spectacular & happy leap of faith \/ that lands just right \/ in a sheer moment of creative thinking \/ setting all things right – and moving forward with more wisdom, and kindness \/ and creativity.
\nif, only.<\/p>\n

even among quilts – there is a . . . ‘hierarchy’.
\nthere are quilts that are so<\/strong> skillful, so splendidly colorful, so visually inventive or spiritually compelling, or that are such well pieced historical records, or personal poems . . . that they are cherished, and wrapped in tissue, and only taken out – on holidays, and handed down from generation to generation, with care and pride \/ until usually, or hopefully, ending up in a museum collection that will not only care for, but share them.<\/p>\n

A$AP Rocky’s ERL quilt \/ was quite – the opposite. totally vernacular in voice,
\nits composition was generic, following a simple ‘template’ \/ lifted from a women’s handiwork supermarket magazine.<\/p>\n

I’ve been reading about Leonard Cohen, lately.
\nhe said: “there is a crack in everything, and that’s how the light gets in.”
\nA$AP Rocky in that old, lumpy vintage \/ not so skillful, not so unique quilt, was just that primordial crack & everybody could feel the light.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OK, SO HERE’S THE FINAL GONNA-BREAK-IT-DOWN \/ YO, DIG-GITTY !!! ART LOVERS TAKE \/ ON . . . THAT SLIGHTLY RAW, WILD, YET MUTED MULTI-COLOR, TINY FLOWER DANCING PRINT – GLOBAL-AUDIENCE-REACHING \/ HISTORY-MAKING \/ MET-SHAKING \/ JUST AWESOME !!! VINTAGE THRIFT SHOP \/ PROBABLY BARGAIN BIN FIND !!! AMERICAN AS PIE DIY, AS LOW-FI AS […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43808"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43808"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43820,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43808\/revisions\/43820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}