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Monday, December 18, 2006

Seeing the Sights in Wisconsin / EZ Rocks!

On Sunday I had the pleasure of seeing many of Elizabeth Zimmermann's garments in person at an exhibit hosted by the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
P1000063

The exhibit, New School Knitting: The Influence of Elizabeth Zimmermann and Schoolhouse Press, was free and open to the public between October 27 and December 17, 2006 at the Design Gallery of the School of Human Ecology.

150 miles/240 kilometers lie between my Chicago home and the gallery, so sadly I missed the opening reception with Meg Swanson on October 27th, as well as the KIPing events on the first Sunday afternoon and the first three Thursday evenings in November.

Even so, I enjoyed seeing EZ's handknits, as well as original correspondence between EZ and her yarn suppliers, and vintage magazine pages.

It was especially nice to see that many of the sweaters were well worn. If you study the photos below, you might make out the small, dark stains on the front of EZ's orange Hybrid Variation Shoulder Cardigan and the frayed right cuff on her original Adult Surprise Jacket.

D, who has impeccably good timing, gifted me with a new camera the day before I made the trek. However, I wasn't comfortable with its macro mode, so I didn't bother with any close ups. If you want details about the designs and materials, head over to my flickr account.

Designs are in chronological order.

1956, Original Rib Warmer:
1956originalribwarmer

1959, Ski Sweater:
1959skisweater

1961, Tomten:
1961tomten1
1961tomten2

1967, Baby Surprise and 2006, Cully-designed Collared Baby Surprise:
1967babysurprises

1980, Hybrid Variation Shoulder Cardigan:
1980hybridvariationshouldercardi

1981, EZ's original Adult Surprise Jacket:
1981ez'sorginaladultsurprise

1982, MS' Long Sleeve Bog Jacket (I didn't realize until I got home that I failed to take a picture of EZ's beautiful 1982 Bog Jacket):
1982ms'longsleevebogjacket

1983, Gaffer's Bavarian Jacket (the shoulder shaping is stunning, sorry the photo doesn't do it justice):
1983gaffer'sbavarianjacket

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5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well done, Rachel! Thanks for a glimpse at the artifacts of a knitting legend.

12:09 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

i was so bummed to miss this exhibit, so thanks for the photos! how nice to get a new camera...us knitbloggers need our pix. :)

9:59 AM  
Blogger Nik said...

wow. how lucky are you that you got the chance to see this.

3:29 PM  
Blogger mary jane said...

What a nice Christmas present for us! Thanks!

9:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Those pictures are very beautiful - they look like the sepia prints that are then partially colored.

Love You,
Cella

7:22 PM  

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