DETROIT — December 5, 2024 — The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) presents Painted with Silk: The Art of Early American Embroidery, a loan exhibition featuring a large selection of remarkably beautiful and well-preserved samplers and silk-on-silk embroideries produced by American girls and young women in the colonial and early national periods. Comprising 69 embroideries and one painting, Painted with Silk: The Art of Early American Embroidery will be on view from December 13, 2024 through June 15, 2025. 

From the early 1700s until about 1830, the education of American girls from well-to-do families emphasized reading, writing, simple arithmetic, and needlework. For these girls, a finely worked embroidery worthy of being framed in their homes served as a kind of diploma. The samplers and silk-on-silk embroideries demonstrated both their mastery of an important practical skill and that they had achieved the self-discipline and refinement expected of the most privileged girls and young women in early American society. Juxtaposing historic embroideries with contemporary ones by the feminist artist Elaine Reichek, Painted with Silk draws attention to cultural assumptions and values related to gender, race, and class.

“Exhibitions at the Detroit Institute of Arts present opportunities to encourage inquiry about ourselves, our history, and our world, and this wonderful presentation is a rare chance to learn more about this important American artform” said DIA Director Salvador Salort-Pons. “The historic and contemporary embroideries displayed in the exhibition will highlight ways in which our values and assumptions are both like and unlike those of earlier Americans.”

Except for one painting and two early English samplers drawn from the DIA’s own collection, all the works in the show were hand-crafted by American school age girls between 1740 and about 1830. Embroidered with fine silk threads on linen, wool, or silk supports, and often framed for display, many of these embroideries became treasured family heirlooms which were passed from generation to generation. Since the early 1900s the most charming and beautiful of them have been sought out by collectors who treasured them as evidence of the skill and values of early American women. Almost all of the embroideries in Painted with Silk are on loan from private collectors eager to share their treasures with the DIA community.

The exhibition is installed in three galleries, beginning with simpler embroideries which were used to teach the alphabet and numbers, and leading to larger and more complex embroideries made with more complex stitches and paint to create more complicated pictures illustrating stories from the Hebrew and Christian Bible or contemporary literature. Many represent home as a place of safety and love. Others emphasize virtues, such as the need to obey and respect parents, teachers and other figures of authority. Some of the largest and most complicated celebrate famous women who sacrificed themselves for the good of their children or husbands. 

Alongside the historic works, the exhibition presents a selection of contemporary embroideries by the acclaimed artist Elaine Reichek. Reichek originally trained as a painter but gave up the practice for embroidery - a medium historically associated with women and dismissed as a craft rather than art. Adapting the form of nineteenth-century schoolgirl samplers, Reichek developed a distinctive visual language which she uses to critique culturally dominant assumptions about society, gender, identity, and culture. 

“Early American embroideries are fascinating survivors from our nation’s past,” said Kenneth John Myers, the DIA’s Byron and Dorothy Gerson Curator of American Art. “Often very beautiful, they are also inherently fragile. Silk threads can get stained, unravel, break or fade. Many surviving embroideries are in poor condition. But thanks to the generosity of several private collectors, the DIA team has been able to share an unusually large selection of very accomplished embroideries in exceptionally fine condition. And the embroideries by Reichek are fabulous.”

To complement the exhibition, the DIA will host several events, many intended for families, providing rich opportunities to learn more about American embroidery and history. Upcoming highlight events include:

• Sunday, December 15, 2024, 1:00 pm-5:45 pm: “Organizing the DIA Exhibition Painted with Silk: The Art of American Embroidery” – Curator Kenneth Myers will give an overview of the exhibition and discuss collecting with several of the private collectors who have lent embroideries for this show. Supported by the Ida and Conrad H. Smith Fund, established by the Raymond C. Smith Foundation Fund of the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan.
• Wednesday, February 12, 2025, 6:30 pm: Emelie Gevalt, a curator at the American Folk Art Museum in New York, will discuss the presence and absence of people of color in historic American schoolgirl embroideries. Sponsored by the DIA’s Associates of the American Wing 
• Wednesday, April 2, 2024, 6:30 pm: DIA curators Kenneth Myers and Katie Pfohl will host contemporary artist Elaine Reichek. Sponsored by the DIA’s Associates of the American Wing