“I started working quilts when I was a child. My mother would have me sit with her, and I was watching her and putting scraps together, doing like she was doing. She’d drop those scraps at her feet, and I’d be picking them up. My mama looked at that thing and told me I did good. I felt good, like I had done a big job.” —Nettie Young, Gee’s Bend quilter

“H Variation Quilt: ‘Milky Way’,” 1971, by Nettie Young © Estate of Nettie Young/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York via Tumblr