Jean Ray Laury

Jean Ray Laury (March 22, 1928 – March 2, 2011) was an American artist and designer.

Born on March 22, 1928, in Doon, Iowa, Jean Ray Laury was the daughter of Ralph and Alice Ray.

She was the second of four girls.

Growing up, Laury's "mother encouraged her to 'do what you want to do, and don't do what everybody else does.'" As a child, Laury loved drawing and painting.

The family moved to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where she graduated from high school.

She was one of the first fine artists to move to quilting as a medium of choice in the late 1950s.

Her quilts followed neither traditional method nor pattern; they were bold, modern, colorful collages, often laced with humor and satire.

Penning over twenty books and teaching over 2,000 workshops, Laury helped women see the creative possibilities in everyday objects and awake their sense of inspiration.

Laury has been called a "foremother of a quilt revival",

and "one of the pioneers" of non-traditional quilts.

She returned to Iowa to attend Iowa State Teachers' College (now University of Northern Iowa), where she earned her bachelor's degree in Art and English in 1950.

After teaching art for several years, she moved to California.

She went on to marry Frank Laury, who worked as a professor at California State University, Fresno, in 1952.

Beginning a master's program in Design at Stanford University, Laury became intrigued by the art of quilting.

Laury gravitated towards quilting because it gave her the flexibility work at home and allowed her to start and stop as needed to take care of her home and children.

While Laury grew up in a small community where quilting was common, she had paid little attention to quiltmaking until now.

Always one to take on a challenge, Laury began experimenting with the craft.

One aspect that Laury was adamant about was that she did not want to work with a pattern.

Inspired by her son Tom, Laury's first quilt was an appliqué quilt called Tom's Quilt.

It was filled with images familiar to children, but Laury interpreted them in a simplified contemporary style.

Incorporating this quilt into her final master's degree project, Laury graduated in 1956.

'Tom's Quilt' was included in a student exhibition at the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco, and led to a solo exhibition there several years later.

Laury entered her first quilt in the 1958 Eastern States Exposition in Storrowton Village in West Springfield, Massachusetts.

Although it did not win any prizes, it attracted the attention of Roxa Wright, one of the jurors and creative editor at House Beautiful magazine.

Through her, Laury got commissions to design quilts for magazine projects.

Later, Laury followed her to Woman's Day.

Jean's designs were included in Better Homes and Gardens, Family Circle, Cosmopolitan, Needle and Craft, and many other publications.

Finding inspiration in everyday objects, Laury's mission was "to blur the lines between fine art (painting and sculpture) and decorative art (fiber, wood, glass, ceramic)."

While she experimented with various mediums, Laury honed in on quiltmaking by the 1970s.

In 88 Leaders in the Quilt World Today, Laury stated, "I like making quilts that grow out of everyday life, so politics, women's issues, major earthly shake-ups and humor are always part of my work. This personal involvement is what draws me to quiltmaking and keeps the field vital."

Laury's keen eye for art and design allowed her to see past the functional benefits of a quilt.

In Ho For California!, Laury speaks to the qualities that early quilts possess beyond warmth:

"Quilts, however, satisfied another need as great as that of physical warmth: the need to feel connected to family and to other generations, the need for continuity. Quilts offered a way of maintaining ties at a time when photographs were uncommon (or unknown), and the arrival of letters by mail could take months. Quilts constituted contact ... Quilts become archetypal symbols of the women who make them. They 'stand in' for the quilter, long after she is gone, revealing to descendants, viewers, or new owners the essence of the quilter – her spirit, energy, vitality, and skill."

Laury believed that "a great quilt exists when it relies on ... the principles of art that make any piece of visual work look great ... I don't see a big difference between fabric on the wall and paint on the wall."

Laury stated that "art has less to do with the material used than with the perceptive and expressive abilities of the individual. Any difference between the 'fine' and the 'decorative' arts is not a matter of material, but rather what the artist brings to the material. Any media may successfully be used at any level for any purpose."

Just like with "traditional" art, what is viewed as great to one person will not necessarily be viewed as great by another.

Everyone has personal experiences that affect their reaction and relationship with a work of art.

Laury's quilt aesthetic is far from traditional.

Taking an innovative and contemporary approach, Laury's quilts are filled with humor, wit, and contradictory images; "a world in which cartoon-like irons fly through the air emitting innocent puffs of steam, absurdly happy housewives pursue their drudgery in a dreamy state of bliss, and politicians are hoisted on their own petards."

While Laury's quilts may be politically charged and confrontational, that is far from her personal demeanor.