Suzanne Gummow

Dare to Differ Talk

On Thursday 3rd July I gave a talk at the Quilters' Guild of SA about the history of "Dare to Differ" a contemporary quilt exhibition held in Adelaide every two years which I conven.
Below is the 'speech' that I gave on the night.

Amazing concepts

Wonderful skill and imagination

Exciting, inspiring, witty

Great stuff

These were some of the comments recorded about the Guild’s first “Dare to Differ” held at Megaw and Hogg in June, 1994 as part of the celebration of the tenth year of the Quilters’ Guild of SA Inc.

“Dare to Differ” was the idea of a small group of Guild members interested in promoting and exhibiting contemporary quilt in our state, South Australia. The model for this was the New South Wales Quilters’ Guild juried exhibition held at the Manly Art Gallery, which has become a prestigious showcase for contemporary art quilting nation-wide. The exhibition was open to all quiltmakers of the Quilters’ Guild of SA and attracted a pleasing response from city and country members. The quilts displayed showed a great variety of interests and techniques.

Committee members were Barbara Hutton, Neta Lewis, Gennie Quinn, Pat Hagan, Deb Nichol, Lyn Uppill, and Quenby Sinclair. Many of these names you will recognize.

It was then decided to hold this event biannually.

The aims of Dare to Differ were (and still are):

To educate the public about contemporary quilts

To raise the awareness of the value of textiles in Visual Arts

To showcase Contemporary Australian Quilts makers

And to encourage SA Quilt makers to be further innovative and daring

The next exhibition was held at the David Jones Gallery in the Adelaide.

In 1997 we saw a move to Prospect Gallery. The theme was “Over the Top”. The title was to steer people away from the traditional quilt and extend their horizons, leaning more to the visual arts. In 1999 the theme was “99 Not Out” and at this time the committee extended the participation to quilters across Australia. This was to showcase the breath and width of what was happening in the contemporary quilt scene throughout Australia. This also gave the South Australian audience an opportunity to see this wonderful broad showcase of contemporary quilts.

In 2001 it was decided that the theme would be dropped and the exhibition title was to remain as

“Dare to Differ”. This is as it is still today.

The exhibition continued at Prospect Gallery for a few more years and then was moved to Gallery M where it has continued until now. This is a larger venue and has showcased the quilts

So this next year 2015 will be its 21^st year.

Over the years many SA quiltmakers have exhibited: Alvena Hall has been in every show, I was in the very first show and have been in most of the exhibitions since, Julie Haddrick has been in many and many other SA quilters have joined the participants from every other state in Australia throughout the years. The quality and number of works has grown throughout the years and I feel that it is an excellent show and encourage all to enter in for the 2015 show. The Dare to Differ – 2015 will be the 21^st year so lets make it the best yet!!

I have been convenor for many of those years (I think about 15) and now feel it is time to pass the role onto to other people so I am resigning from my role after the 2015 Dare to Differ and wish to ask for those who would like to see this exhibition continue to see me about how they could be involved.

So if you wish to be involved in the next "Dare to Differ - 2015" contact me through my email: suzannegummow@bigpond.com

Below are photos from the night