Speaking of colons, that reminds me of an interesting place to visit ~ the Mutter Museum. The Mutter Museum is in Philadelphia and houses a collection of all sorts of medical specimens and oddities displayed in beautiful wooden cabinets ~ a 2 floor cabinet of curiosities! In addition to the soap lady, specimen jars of conjoined twins, and a plaster cast of Chang and Eng's attached livers, the Mutter owns the World's Largest Colon! (pictured above). If you look carefully you can see a photograph of the man whose colon this was ~ unfortunately I was not blogging at the time of my visit so this is the only photo I could locate.
My favorite display was the Chevalier Jackson Collection of objects swallowed and removed. There are over 2,000 objects displayed in a labelled wooden flat file ~ all removed without surgery!
Amidst the coins, safety pins, small toys, dental plates and bones, there were an awful lot of Sunday school pins. My boyfriend and I had gotten the itch to visit the Mutter after visiting the Glore Psychiatric Museum in St. Joseph, MO, on one of our first dates. At the Glore, we were entranced by a display of over 1,446 metal objects one woman had swallowed, thus prompting our guide to suggest a visit to the Mutter. Roadside America has interesting reviews on both the Mutter and the Glore Museums ~ make sure to read before you visit!
One more thing, at the time of each of my visits, I was disappointed with the selection in the gift stores ~ I felt that both places really missed opportunity to cash in on their collections. As my brother is a psychiatrist, my initial reason for stopping in at the Glore was to see if I could find a humorous gift for him. In the past, the Glore gift store had sold actual patient art, but now it is art made from kits, not nearly as interesting. As for the Mutter, why not sell a "Soap Woman on a Rope" or a "World's Largest Colon" keychain ~ who wouldn't want such a keepsake?!
Make sure to add these two museums to your bucket list ~ you won't be disappointed and I doubt you will see anything like it anywhere else!
While doing this post, I have found that this book is now available in the Mutter Museum shop.
{thread wrapped wire basket}
{wire wrapped leaf sculpture; detail below}
{glass bead and wire wrapped bowl ~ for sale in the gift store}
{wrapped paper beads wall textile; detail on left}
{wire & bead chandelier}
{ball chain chandelier}
{natural gourd bangles}
Eugene Von Bruenchenhein: “Freelance Artist—Poet and Sculptor—Innovator—Arrow maker and Plant man—Bone artifacts constructor—Photographer and Architect—Philosopher” is the title of the special exhibit on display at the American Folk Art Museum until October. Quite the mouthful ~ both his name and description of his work!
These ballpoint drawings were the work I liked best ~ there were many pieces displayed on the walls, but there was also an entire book of drawings adhered to the pages of an old wallpaper book.
In addition to the figural and object folk art I posted about yesterday, the American Folk Art Museum had a lovely collection of quilts on display when I visited. I thought I would share some of my favorites ~ visit here to see more of their quilt collection and read more details about the individual quilts and their history. What are your favorites?
The images above depict a wonderful, very unique crazy quilt ~ each of the inset vignettes show a different horse and rider. I don't know that I have seen a crazy quilt with round motifs used ~ most of those I am familiar with look more like the surrounding background. The stitch work on this piece was just gorgeous.
The following two images are examples of a technique called trapunto ~ the design is created by stitching a pattern on a quilt sandwich (3 layers: quilt top, batting, and the quilt backing), then stuffing the motifs with small amounts of cotton from the back to create a subtle design.
{beautiful white on white trapunto quilt}
{Interesting combination of pieced quilt design and trapunto}
{handwritten script that looks like it was applied with a fountain or dip pen}
{names were embroidered on this quilt}
{Tiny appliques applied by 79 year old Maria make up the lettering on this quilt!}
{Image from here}
This last quilt is a traditional log cabin design in a just gorgeous color palette ~ the photos don't do it justice! I've only shown a small sample of the American Folk Art Museum's collection ~ if you get the opportunity, do visit yourself ~ it is an inspirational way to spend an afternoon!
If you could have one of these quilts for your own, which would you choose? I don't know if I could just choose one!
When in NYC, a visit to the American Folk Art Museum should definitely be on your list! This was my first visit to this museum ~ while it isn't huge, it is several floors and the exhibits covered many different art forms carefully curated and beautifully displayed. While eating lunch in the small cafe at the museum, we heard that it will be closing at its current location as the Museum of Modern Art has purchased the building. Hopefully the Folk Art Museum will be able to reopen somewhere else ~ in the meantime, if you get the chance, stop in ~ you won't be disappointed! View more of the museum's collection here.
{loved this stylish man!}
Here is a small selection of the variety of figures the museum has in its collection: carved wood, sculpted clay, mosaics of glass, and metal are some of the materials used.
{what an imposing group of relatives}
{this weather vane was huge!}
Below is a small selection of some of the objects on display ~ these were some of my favorites:
{a hand made and illustrated pillow}
{amazing crown of thorns tramp art building}
{fabulous display of tin objects: top hat, glasses, candelabra, bonnet, & fan}
{brightly colored brushwork on this tole ware pot}
{lovely stencil design and color on metal piece}
{grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!}
{cute little painted dog ~ I love the expression on his face!}
