Quilts in Women‘s Lives (1981)

About the Film

This 15 minute excerpt includes the sections on artist/teacher Grace Earl, the artist and Bulgarian immigrant Radka Donnell, and the African American quilter Nora Lee Condra. The complete film includes the work of seven women and is available on a newly remastered DVD from New Day Films (educational use).

Quilts was a ground breaking film used by folklorists, anthropologists and historians of art and womens history that presented the lives, art, work and philosophy of ordinary women in the days when few documentaries came from women filmmakers. This deceptively simple film won most of the major awards for independent films during the years after its release in 1981, including Emily Grand Prize, American Film Festival; 1st Place Fine Arts, San Francisco International Film Festival; Best of Festival, National Educational Film and Video Festival, New York International Film Festival, Margaret Mead Film Festival.