This exhibit presents for the first time paper quilts created from the Hamilton border archive and features cut paper imagery from Hamilton's Globe collection. To purchase one of the prints on display in the gallery visit our online store.
Jim Sherraden has been an active and popular printmaker since 1980 and his work is collected by individuals and institutions worldwide. His art has toured with the Smithsonian and has been shown at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, as well as multiple venues both in the United States and abroad. He is also an award winning author and lyricist.
Since 1984 Jim’s name has been synonymous with Hatch Show Print, the iconic letterpress poster and design shop in Nashville, Tennessee. For his work at Hatch, Sherraden was a recipient of the 2013 Distinguished Artist Award for the state of Tennessee, is the American Advertising Nashville 2013 Silver Medalist, and was awarded the Krider Prize for Creativity by the UCDA in the fall of 2014.
Jim has been the Visiting Artist at Hamilton for the last three years and currently serves on our Artists Advisory Board. Jim has been interested in the borders in the Hamilton collection since first coming to the museum in 2002. He was enamored with the intricate designs created on the die-stamping machine. To create the quilt pieces for this exhibition he selected and printed the borders on-site at the museum, die cut the printed pieces into fragments, and assembled them into traditional or non traditional quilt-like patterns before mounting them with book binding glue on a master backing sheet. Finally, watercolors were applied to the art and uv protectant covers the final collage.
For the pieces that resemble watches in this exhibition Jim was inspired by the Hamilton Watch Company out of Lancaster, PA. In 1957 they created the first electric watch, powered by a battery no larger than a shirt button. The company also thought it was important to manufacture a modern exterior that was as futuristic and modern as the workings inside. Automobile designer Richard Arbib was selected, and his asymmetrical designs (cases) remain as innovative and revolutionary as they were in the late 1950s, and are collected worldwide. Jim owns a couple of these watches and realized he could tie together his appreciation for the Hamilton watches and the Hamilton wood type archives with these 7 pieces. They are shaped from the asymmetrical series, using Globe Poster Co. images which are exactly and precisely from the same fifties era as the watches.
On Friday, October 5,2018 from 5-7 pm there was a reception for the gallery opening of this exhibition. You can see this stunning work at the museum through the end of 2018. If you're interested in purchasing a piece from this exhibit check out the "In the Gallery" section of Hamilton Dry Goods.
