QSOS Interview with Monna Kornman

Olga C McClaren (OCM): This is Olga C McClaren. Todays date is November the 4th, 2011 and it is 4:30. Im conducting an interview with Monna Kornman for Quilters S.O.S. Save our Stories a project of the Alliance for American Quilts. Monna and I are at the International

Monna Kornman (MK): Its not Mona, its Monna.

OCM: Monna?

MK: Like Donna.

OCM: Like Donna, thank you for correcting me. This is Monna Kornman.

MK: Kornman, Kornman.

OCM: Korn

MK: K-O-R-N-M-A-N.

OCM: Kornman, okay. Monna and I are at the International Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas. Lets start Monna with this beautiful quilt youve brought. 00:01:00What can you tell me about it?

MK: I was inspired to do a crazy quilt when my aunt left her house, she left a real old, old crazy quilt all wool, embroidered, and just in threads, but I was so fascinated with it that I wanted to make one. I started collecting velvet to make one and Ive got velvet clothing and velvet from sample books and collected enough to make the quilt. Then just embellished it and I had more fun embroidering and collecting stuff to put on it and I put my signature on the corner and you know, in kind of traditional crazy quilt fashion.

OCM: What special meaning does it have for you?

MK: I just like to do that kind of thing. I got Judith Montanos book which showed me kind of how to proceed and I took that as my instruction and went from there. Then I entered it in the quilt show here in I think it was ninety

OCM: Ninety

MK: 1997

OCM: 1997 I think

MK: I took second place on it and all my friends just didnt, they just didnt like it because I didnt get first. I said, You know, when you put something in a show, you put it in there for people to see, and I dont ever expect to get a blue ribbon or a red ribbon or anything, I just want to have people appreciate quilting. Thats my aim, is to let it grow.

OCM: Do you think if people looking at this can tell anything about you?

MK: Oh I dont know. They might think I have a fetish [laughs.] I just like to do handwork. I love to embroider. A lot of those are just original designs, I just take the needle and thread and start. Some of them are kind of patterned to start with and I follow it, the design or pattern. A lot of the velvets were printed and I embroidered in the same areas, followed the print, and it came out real nice. It was fun to do.

OCM: Its just amazing. What do you do with this quilt in your home?

MK: I just hang it.

OCM: It is hanging.

MK: I havent hung it in my new home yet. I have taken it and shared it with 00:04:00school children, they absolutely love it. I took it to my grandsons daycare when he was about four, and the kids just went nuts, I almost couldnt get it away from them. Then just yesterday I took it to my nieces third grade class and talked to them about quilts and then I told them I was going to talk to them about a crazy quilt today and they asked, Do you know what that id? and none of them did. Then I said, Well Im going to show you one and were going to talk about crazy quilts and then you can come up and touch it, and they were just so excited, I was just thrilled that they loved it so. It was fun.

OCM: Thats wonderful.

MK: Excuse me.

OCM: I want to ask some questions now to get you to talk about yourself as a quilter, about your interest in quiltmaking. Can you tell me where that may have sprung from?

MK: Im 83 and Ive been quilting about fifty years at least but I was inspired from about three years old. My grandmother was a quiltmaker, she was a professional seamstress and she made quilts all the time in her spare time and she had made beautiful quilts. She made one for me and gave it to me for a wedding present and it was all red and green patches, the design was all in red and green and I put it on my bed for several years. Finally, it got so I needed to launder it and I didnt know any different and threw it in the washing machine, so it kind of was a sad thing and I couldnt use it on my bed anymore 00:06:00so I put it away. Now I bring it out every Christmas and put it under my Christmas tree because its red and green. I still get to use it and it still gets to be very much a treasure to me.

OCM: What age did you start quiltmaking?

MK: I started sewing when I could barely walk. Threading a needle, trying to thread a needle from the time I was about three. Ive always sewed doll clothes and made quilts when I was tiny, and I dont know what age that was. Then when I was in high school I started a quilt of nine patches and collected old dress fabrics and everything to put in them. Finally then, about fourteen, fifteen years later, when I had a baby, I put the rest of it together and made a quilt for her. She passed away when she was twenty-three from a fall and I 00:07:00buried the quilt with her because it was so dear to her. That was one of the sad incidences but quilts are a comfort, quilts are comforting. The quilt guild in Dallas [Texas.] makes quilts all the time for children and they give them to the people at Vogel Alcove and they are where parents leave their children when they work and some people at Ronald McDonald, we make quilts for them when their parents have to come and stay and bring their kids to stay at the hospital, and they present them with a quilt. Those kind of things I think are very important, theyre comforting.

OCM: Yes they are.

MK: I made my grandson a baby quilt and then I, when he was about in junior high 00:08:00one Christmas, always gave him a great big box, usually a coat or jacket or something and this year he wanted to know what was in that package, What was in that package? I said, You just have to wait and see, and so I made a flannel three layer quilt with the fringe you know where you cut it and wash it, and its a good sized throw. When he opened the box, he was just absolutely amazed and he said, For me? and he wont let it out of his sight hardly, he lays under it on the couch when he watches TV and everything.

OCM: Still to this day?

MK: Still to this day. Well hes seventeen now.

OCM: Oh. So your family has really been fortunate to

MK: They have been really supportive of me, yes.

OCM: You furnish them with quilts?

MK: Yes, I try. I try to make them for all my grandchildren then I got into the great-grandchildren and Ive given up now [laughs.] I havent had time to make anymore.

OCM: Maybe they can pass them on, the parents can.

MK: Well, Im hoping to the next, you know, I expect they will.

OCM: How many, how long do you work on quilting, every week or month?

MK: I just, sometimes I get a quilt I just dont put down and sometimes I work from time to time. I dont have any set schedule or anything. I dont have, I dont go much like I used to because, since I had my hip replacement. I just work when I feel like it. I have two quilts that are ready to finish. One is a 00:10:00hexagon quilt in the diamond shape all in Christmas fabric and its got each individual block is different, one has got ornaments in the block, theyre all fussy cut you know, and ones got Santa Clauses, ones got angel, and ones got houses, ones got trees, and its a big quilt and its about ready to quilt, I have to put the border on it and quilt it.

OCM: Have you embroidered all of those designs?

MK: No I didnt embroider these.

OCM: Okay, you didnt.

MK: Those are just Christmas fabrics.

OCM: Just Christmas fabrics.

MK: This is the only quilt that I have embroidered except my friendship group I was in charge of for a few years, and when I turned it over to somebody else, they all made me crazy quilt blocks at that time and they were little four inch blocks. So I put those together with a strip and then I embroidered the Texas 00:11:00Blue Bonnets in one corner between the quilts, the blocks I mean.

OCM: Youve mentioned one such experience, but can you think of any other times that your quilting has gotten you through times in your life?

MK: Well not exactly gotten through times in my life, I suppose but its always been a comfort to me to be working on fabric. I guess youd say Im in love with fabric. When my children were little, I needed anew bedspread and I thought, You know, I hate to go spend the money to buya huge bedspread for my bed, and my mother had a big sample, several big sample books of polished 00:12:00cotton, and they were pretty good size and I said, Are you going to do anything with those mother? and she said, No, and I said, Well why dont you give them to me and Ill make a quilt. I took all of those and cut them out, you know, took them out of the book and cut them to size and made, just put them together. Then there were solid colors to go with them and I took all the solids and cut them into little strips and put little rail fence all the way around the outside of it. Then I quilted it in long stitch so I could get it done in a hurry and I put cheese cloth on the back so it was really light. I kept that quilt for years, then when I decided Id get rid of it I said, my mother said, Well, what are you going to do with it? and I said, Well, I dont know you can have it if you want it. So she took it home with her and she took it to an antique dealer and sold it [laughs.] I guess they paid her 00:13:00pretty good for it.

OCM: That is an amusing story.

MK: Well quilt stories are interesting, arent they? [laughs.]

OCM: They are. This kind of reminds me of one of the things that a lot of quilters talk about is how our quilting compares to people, women, you know, hundred, two-hundred or so years ago and you are doing the same thing they did

MK: Thats sort of the same that they had

OCM: By using what you had.

MK: Right. I was always taught to do that. I was born during the depression, so I was always told, taught to make the most of what you had. That came by me naturally. The other thing that I just did recently was my mother started to quilt. My mother was never really a quilter, m grandmother was the quilter, but mother started several. I finished two of hers, one was a Springtime in the Rockies that she was making when I was just a little girl and it was beautiful 00:14:00colors and I just could resist to use like red and green and kind of an orange and it was a kind of a fan pattern, its called Springtime in the Rockies, the pattern that came out in the Kansas City Star, and that was when they were, you know sending out patterns with the newspaper. So mother started it and she had in her drawer and in her house for years, and about twenty years ago I said, Mother would you please finish that quilt, because I just love that quilt. She decided that shed hurry it up, so its got some little triangles between everything, she had decided to do those on the sewing machine and they didnt come out very well [laughs.] so I said, Well just give it to me and Ill finish it. I took all the fabric that she had and all the pieces that she had done and I took all of those machine stitched stuff apart, I went to a 00:15:00retreat and I just about got it done in that retreat. I did that all over and finished the quilt, and put it in the Dallas [Texas.] show and it won a blue ribbon [laughs.] Then I put it in the Paducah [Kentucky.] show; I dont remember I think it got an honorable mention or something there. I still have it. This year, the one that she started those hexagons when I was about, 1930 I guess I was just a baby. She got it, she got the quilt finished to the point where she didnt know what to do with the edges and so she just put it away and never did any more to it. She died a couple years ago, she was 101, she never had finished that quilt and so I took it this summer and I finished it out with the red that was from the, you know they copied the colors now from the old 00:16:00quilts, and I took the reds that were from because there was red here and there in some of the prints. They were prints from my grandmothers dresses and from my aunts dresses and some of them my baby dresses when I was a child, and all these memories of the family and so I finished all of those edges. But the fabrics were so fragile compared to what we have today, and the edges were a little bit more secure than the centers and I worked on it so long and I thought, Well, I dont think I want to quilt this, so a friend of my mines quilting it for me now and she says shell get done in time for me to put it in the Dallas [Texas.] show because I dont want to put it in the show for a prize, but I want to put it in the show because it demonstrates where quilts, how they develop and where we are with quilts today and just let people 00:17:00sit and compare you know.

OCM: The history.

MK: Itll be interesting.

OCM: When you mentioned the retreat you went to, do you belong to any quilting groups?

MK: I belong to the Dallas [Texas.] Quilters Guild and the AQS and IQA.

OCM: How do you feel that these are nourishing to your quilting?

MK: I think theyre very important because I think they prolong the interest in quilts a lot. I know people that dont know how much good they do, but we have all the charities that we you know, take care of too. A quilt is the most comforting thing in the world, theyre like a teddy bear to a kid, usually theyll never let them go. I mean, my daughters quilts, she would, she was in college and I loaned the quilt to a friends baby one night when they came 00:18:00over and it was snowing, it was in Minnesota, and when she came home that night she said, Wheres my quilt? and I said, Oh I let so-and-so take it home, Mother, you got to get that quilt back. I did.

OCM: She loved it.

MK: She just wouldnt, it was comfort to her. I even have quilts that Im fond of and I sleep under one of the antique quilts that Ive got.

OCM: I was going to ask you if you sleep under a quilt. Tell us about it.

MK: It was pieced by one of my ancestors, my aunt, my mothers oldest sister who was quite old when I got it, told me that it had been pieced by a cousin of hers who was nearly blind and the colors were, it was a Lone Star quilt and the 00:19:00colors were in the right places but it had been washed and the pinks or reds had run and so now the whole quilt is kind of pink, but its still in good shape and the fabrics are still good. It feels so good to sleep under because we just in Texas throw a quilt over once and a while when its chilly.

OCM: Whats one of your favorite things about quilting, the quilting process?

MK: I just like the creative process. I like the design work and I like the, I dont like to do like stars, thats not my favorite thing. I like to do mostly traditional looking things, things that, but I want to add a little twist to something artistic to it if I can, like the Christmas quilt with individual cutting, I like to do that. I guess I like piecing, hand piecing, I dont like 00:20:00sewing machine work, and I dont like to quilt on the sewing machine and I dont like machine quilting quilts when you hand do them. If you piece them by sewing machine then its fine to do them you know, with the machine. I think some machine quilting is excellent, its beautiful. I like all of it, I like all of it.

OCM: Tell me about where you create your quilts? The room or the studio, or whatever you call it.

MK: Right now I have a wonderful place to work. I always had a corner for my things and Ive got three rooms of fabric I say, Ive always gone to the shows and collected things. Ive got a collection for an African quilt and I have a collection of feed sacks and I have a collection of silk and a collection of wool. Ive got things ahead of me that Ill never get done, but its 00:21:00fun. I told my friend who I came here with, I said, Dont let me feel any fabric, because I cant resist it. [laughs.]

OCM: [laughs.] Too tempting. Well tell me about the space where you work.

MK: I have now since we built our house, I have a room, a large room with high ceilings and I have an old table that was out of one of my husbands old offices one of those old library tables with two little drawers which is wonderful for needles and all the little things that you need to store. I have also two sewing machines set up. I have a Bernina and a Pfaff and I have one of those little Singers that I think Im not going to use anymore because I just 00:22:00take that on retreat. They hve a retreat up to Lake Texoma [Oklahoma] from Dallas [Texas.] guild every year and I used to go to that all the time and drive and everything, never be stopped by anything. It was really lovely because my husband and I are very much independent, hes a golfer and Im a quilter. He does golf tournaments and hes finally had to give up one that he did annually that was a big charity, because he cant do it anymore, he had surgery last year. We are just rocking along in our new home out by Lake Ray Hubbard [Texas.] and I have this big room and then the bath is next to it with the laundry washer and drier in there with a sink and then the bath behind it, so its just a stool and the tub are separate you know, and the washer and drier and the big 00:23:00hutch is on one wall, and then for all the stuff I need to do. Then its got two closets in there that are stuffed with batting and lace and all that kind of thing and the two sewing machines and also another storage chest and a couch. When I take a nap during the days, which I do now often, I always go into my sewing room to sleep on that couch and then I have a little Chihuahua that always wants to be on my lap, so hes a treasure. My husband goes to play golf so I can just do my own thing and then I have a big yard now and I cant do my yard work anymore but weve got somebody to do all that now and Ive got somebody come in the back and help which I never thought Id ever do.

OCM: Do you use a design wall?

MK: No I dont. I have a guest bed that I put everything on to look at. I actually put my quilts on the floor and stretch them when I baste them. I cant get down there very well anymore. I think Ive next what Im going to have to have somebody baste.

OCM: Sounds like its a wonderful space to work.

MK: Oh it is, its just heavenly. Its got windows all on one side. I have lots of windows in this house and its light and we just love it.

OCM: Are there any quilting techniques that you particularly favor?

MK: I use needle turn on appliqu and Ive been doing that ever since I used to enter their contest for the block contest you know, and the first one I 00:25:00entered was an appliqu and I didnt know how to do it, but I finally wound up just turning it under and sewing it down. Then I discovered later that thats the best way to do it. Then I got Pat Campbells books and she uses needle turn and then I took one of her classes on the cruise I went on to the Caribbean. I learned quite a bit from her but a lot of it I figured out by myself, Im just experimentation over time. She was a wonderful appliqur and fun person. Anyway, that was about that technique and then the embroidery and I guess hand piecing is what I enjoy most. I have awful trouble with the corners 00:26:00if I do it by machine, those sharp corners, I can do it but its tedious for me, I dont enjoy it like I do just sitting down and working with my hands.

OCM: Do you use a quilting frame?

MK: I have used all kinds of quilting frames. When I was little my mother had the one from the ceiling and she had the women come in and quilt you know, for a day, and I played under the quilt. Then I got a quilting frame that sits on the floor and you roll it and thats what I did the first quilt that I ever quilted on. Then I got hoops and I tried that, and I like that the best. Then I have one thats on a frame with a hoop, and its got a magnifying light, and its great, but I really like to just take the hoop and go sit down on the couch, and work from that. If it spaced it really good, then thats always fun 00:27:00to quilt from and I can sit there for hours and quilt.

OCM: Thats great. Has modern technology influenced your work in any way?

MK: Modern technology is wonderful, but I dont think its for me.

OCM: Okay.

MK: I think a lot of people have just really progressed with all the things that they have to offer, but I dont enjoy the idea of doing embroidery on the sewing machine, or doing design work on a computer, because Id rather not sit in front of the computer, Id rather just sit in a comfortable chair and daydream. I dont like to look at the screen and work things out like an engineer. I like to play with it, but not on the computer. So I dont use the computer. My husband does all that and he doesnt use it much, but he uses it for what he needs and hell do anything for me that I need to do and Ive 00:28:00got a son-in-law whose just a whiz and anything we cant figure out or need to do, hell do it for us. Thats the way to go for me. I dont even have one of those fancy phones, everybodys got those fancy phones, but I can get along with just making a phone call.

OCM: Now some things you said have given me an idea of how you think about and design your quilts, it sounds like youre really influenced by the fabrics that you have. You talked about having the fabrics for an African quilt. How do you get an idea?

MK: I do collect fabrics and that does help me influence the design because when you lay the fabrics out, then you start to you know, get ideas. The other thing is, I guess, I got this, I just like to have everything be a little bit off the 00:29:00beaten track; I dont like to use a pattern, its somebody elses idea and Id rather develop my own. Id rather try to create something thats a little different from what everybody else does, to me thats the challenge.

OCM: That kind of leads in to what do you think makes a great quilt? Were all so different.

MK: I think that a quilt, a really good quilt needs to have like, a universal appeal. I think it needs to be something thats attractive, thats pretty, thats, its stimulating or its calming or it has an influence on your 00:30:00feelings. I think that sometimes we can go too deep. I think special exhibits can have things that are very strongly political but I dont like to see that, it doesnt generally appeal to everybody, it appeals only to a certain segment. A really great quilt to me would appeal to everybody, its like great art.

OCM: Artistically powerful to you is?

MK: Something that everybody appreciates, that everybody can enjoy.

OCM: You are a great quiltmaker, what is your opinion about what makes a great quiltmaker?

MK: Oh [laughs.] I think anybody that has a passion for it can make a quilt that is good enough, you know? It doesnt have to be perfect. I think that detail 00:31:00is great for entry, entering in to competitions and I think its great for the fact that it will maybe endure longer, but sometimes its not in the details, its in the impression it creates. They say sometimes dont use raw edges; theres a place for raw edges. When I made this crazy quilt, they said all quilts had to have three layers, so I had to put batting in this in order to enter it.

OCM: Even though the fabrics themselves were so heavy?

MK: Right, right. But that was a rule. So if youre going to enter something you have to follow the rules.

OCM: Youve mentioned several quilters whose books you have bought

MK: Oh yes.

OCM: Are there any people youd like to mention that youre drawn to their work or influenced?

MK: I love Paula Nedelsterns work. I think shes just fantastic. I think Kumiko Frydl has done some of the most stunning things I have ever seen and her work is just beautiful. So I admire a lot of other quilters, and I like to go through the shows and admire the other quilting and what is submitted. I would hate to judge them. I dont like to, I dont like to be too opinionated about judging, its hard and I never feel bad if I dont win. Some people come crying, Well I think I should have won, and I said, Well, theres a lot of things entered into that. If youre putting your quilt in 00:33:00the show to win, thats the wrong reason.

OCM: Have you ever judged?

MK: No. I dont want to judge.

OCM: [laughs.] Why, this may be a redundant question to you but maybe youll think of something else to say, why quiltmaking is important in your life?

MK: I think that it has just been the answer to what I like to do. I worked all my life and retired from the communications industry and my daughters now working in the communications industry and she is verycreative too, she loves to cook, I hate to cook, but she just loves it and she likes to cater, she loves giving parties but shes very talented in all of her sewing things, She can 00:34:00make something just like that, she can do anything, but she made a quilt when she was in high school and I quilted it for her because she wasnt adept to doing thins but stitching in and out, but the quilt was Bright Hopes and she picked out some pretty fabrics and pieced it herself. Shes a treasure for me.

OCM: Oh yes. Im wondering how you feel that your quilts not only reflect you, but do they reflect your environment, your community, or your region in any way?

MK: I dont know. I dont know about that. I think they do reflect me and I 00:35:00think, I hope theyre a comfort to other people and I do quite a bit of helping other people when they have problems. We have a group that, a friendship group that meets every week, and I dont always go now but I used to go religiously, from ten to four, which makes a really good timeout during the week. Theres also an appliqu group thats coming from the same group now that meets once a month but thats such a great influence to help people get started and to do better things and Ive helped some people get started that are just doing great now. Thats such a good feelings, that theyre getting the same kind of joy from what theyre doing and feeling really worthwhile to do.

OCM: So you are a teacher in a way?

MK: In a way

OCM: Yeah.

MK: I dont teach publicly but I taught in the school room the other day and I 00:36:00was kind of shy about that, Ive always been kind of shy, but youd never know it now would you? Anyway, its a real joy to be considered among the top quilters, its just thrilling to me to be noticed for what you do, I think its encouraging to everybody and Ive always loved encouragement or the people and what theyre doing because I think its so great to keep encouraging, because that gives you stimulation to keep going. I think thats been such a help to me.

OCM: Have you ever thought about if there are any challenges that are facing we quilters today?

MK: I guess the most challenging I think that people have right now. I dont 00:37:00know all over the world is in such a turmoil and I do think quilting is a wonderful escape and I think people are wanting to do things with quilts that will be a benefit to some of these crises. Im not sure that it works, I think theres so much unrest and I dont think that we can resolve that, if we can help one person at a time, thats about what I feel my job is to help one person at a time, where Im given opportunities to help one person, you know as we go through life. I think you do more good than if you try to do some big thing. I guess the quilting enters into it sometimes.

OCM: Well were nearing the end of this and I want us to leave time for you to tell some more stories or anything else that you would like to say.

MK: The stories is whats interesting, isnt it?

OCM: Yes.

MK: I trying to think what I told the people today at the museum. I went in the door and they grabbed me and made me go over and answer questions about my quilt. I told them several stories but they just come to mind, you know. I cant think of anything offhand.

OCM: You cant remember what you said?

MK: Told you just about everything thats interesting. I cant think of anything more.

OCM: Youve had a long and interesting quilting life.

MK: Oh I have. Im thankful for that. Ive enjoyed it. Sometimes I have felt 00:39:00t hat Ive been selfish in retreating into quilting, but thats just my personality and it think everybodys entitled to their personality and I have quit feeling guilty about that. My mother used to always want me to be up and busy and doing and she had lots of energy and she cooked and she was president of AWP and she sold real estate and she was very flamboyant and she always wanted me to be up and busy, and I wasnt like that and I think its alright. I think its alright, I think everybody is entitled to be themselves.

OCM: And quilting just happened to fit.

MK: It fit my personality.

OCM: Your personality.

MK: I would sit and embroider tea towels when I was little, and she said, Well get up and do something. [laughs.] Thats not necessarily the thing 00:40:00to do. Every child is different.

OCM: Theres always something thats different in different peoples minds.

MK: Everybodys different. Thats about all I can think of that anybody would be interested in, maybe not even all of that.

OCM: Well, Id like to thank Monna Kornman for allowing me to interview her today for the Quilters S.O.S. Save Our Stories oral history project. Our interview is concluded at 5:08. Thank you so much.

MK: Thank you.

OCM: And Im sorry I pronounced your name incorrectly

MK: Oh thats okay.

OCM: As we began

MK: Everybody does that, and it doesnt bother me anymore.

OCM: Well thank you for telling us the correct pronunciation.