Royal Queens/Textiles Featured Artists Alpha Bruton & Gerald Sanders

"WH on Cottage" is a new GALLERY

Located  in the Woodlawn Community, at the POAH Woodlawn Resource Center. The new gallery boarders the University of Chicago's,  Washington Park the  Art and Business Corridor of Cottage Grove/ 63rd. 

"We are bringing vitality, art and culture to Woodlawn and the surrounding community" says William Hill

Please visit our new gallery located at 6144 S Cottage Grove, Chicago IL 60637. Gallery is open by appointment only contact William Hill at 312-351-0573for more information.

William Hill Gallery exhibits the work of distinguished visual artists who are devoted to the critical investigation of nature, culture, race, gender and the postcolonial imagination. With an emphasis on painting, photography, sculpture, video and installation art, these artists highlight postmodern strategies, which challenge traditional modes of representation. William Hill Gallery is dedicated to the exhibition, scholarship and acquisition of 21st century contemporary art.

Gallery Curators William G. Hill and Roe Melloe

Alpha Bruton, Artist and Boardmember William G. Hill Fine Art Center

Featured artist Alpha Bruton is a painter and installation artist, Bruton synthesizes aspects of theater, sculpture, and other two-dimensional forms. Her work has been exhibited in numerous venues in the United States and Internationally. As an installation artist, her current work is a simulation of  ceremonial purification circles, in which objects and images are selected to “serve as cultural mirrors and the sites in which they are situated serve as part of a broader cultural commentary.” The artist has examined cultural signs and symbols and their use or interpretation. She believes that objects in the public sphere serve to communicate and reinforce certain cultural narratives, hierarchies, and social mythologies.

Lakeland Georgia Cotton farm, while exploring the art of folk quilting

"My current textile/quilt projects reflect the following study" 

Contemporary –and Improvisational Quilts “Crazy quilt”: unique type of patchwork irregularly shaped scraps of silks and velvets are pieced together, then lavishly embroidered. The term "crazy" is defined as full of cracks or flaws, as having the appearance of crazed pottery, broken into irregular segments. Contemporary memory quilts preserve treasured memories of people, events, accomplishments, and places. Quilters of previous generations saved scraps of fabrics from dresses, aprons, or shirts out of necessity to use in their quilts, creating the unintended, yet still special, tradition of quilts holding special memories and connections to people in our families.

Pine Burr Quilt Pattern, variation has a three-dimensional look, this quilt pattern is unique to African Americans, and the women slaves of Gee’s Bend plantation of Alabama.  The collection starts in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, hand stitched quilts designed by these women, and provided markers for leading blacks from the south to the north.

Nine Patch Block- Nine-patch quilts children often learned to sew by making those simple blocks, by the 20th century, there are only a handful of basic Nine-Patch blocks with hundreds of cousins. And, as with families, cousins often bear little resemblance to each other.  

Jacob’s ladder a variation it is to be dated back to the 1830’s when women were most active in the formative years of the abolitionist movement. This pattern eventually became known as the Underground Railroad block, but was not published as such until after 1870’s. Quilts in this pattern were often hung outside to indicate a safe house for runaway slaves.

Gearld Sanders THE CONTEMPORARY REALIST  

A self taught artist, the son of Arkansas sharecroppers. His parents came to Chicago to better themselves when he was six and this is when he started drawing. His work has been selling since the age of eleven, at fifteen he was teaching art out of his parents apartment. By the age of seventeen Mrs. Rose Kennedy, the mother of the president, Senator Edward M. Kennedy and the Sears Foundation were among the owners of a Sanders original.

He won awards in high school and was the subject of many newspaper accounts and articles, including in 1967 a three page spread in the Chicago Sun Times, Midwest magazine, titled "portrait Of A Young Man, As A Serious Artist".

  After High School and various freelance jobs in  art, he was drafted into the  United States Army where he eventually became a Arts and Crafts instructor in the Special Services at Ft. Hauchuca, Arizona. There he taught drawing and painting and learned how to teach photography, ceramics and candle making. It was while teaching in the Army that he further developed the technique he had started as a teenager. It is this Technique that has become such a phenomenal success.

Gerald Sander's sharing his drawing sketchbook during reception.

Opening Reception for NEW IDENTITIES IN CONTEMPORARY REALISM was a success!  

Over 200 guest. artists and art supports, joined us for an evening of celebration. Food provided by Out the Box.

WH on Cottage looks to bring cultural and artistic opportunities to Woodlawn and its surrounding communities. Art unites people, allows the imagination to fly and creates space for conversation.  It is our goal to bring the works of both emerging and established artists to the attention of people within the community. 

Second Fridays is an endeavor that will bring monthly art shows to Woodlawn beginning in January of 2017 and proceeding to the spring of 2018. Art shows will run monthly and will include an opening on the second Friday of each month. 

Roe , Robert Carr, Keith Conners