The quilt squares above use patterns that carried subliminal messages during the American Civil War. Hanging a certain quilt on a clothesline would signal that a house was safe for soldiers of either the Union or the Confederacy to stay the night. Abolitionists also quilted specific patterns to guide enslaved people north to freedom. Rendered here in found domestic fabrics, these coded patterns reference the resourceful workarounds women have been using for generations, and that they continue to use in a country with deteriorating reproductive healthcare.

MONEY QUILTS

Money Quilts were inspired by a study of how wealthy families raise their sons to strive for financial success and their daughters to pursue passions, help others, and not to worry about accumulating wealth.