Phyllis Stephens

Phyllis Stephens is a fifth-generation quilt maker who lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia. She is considered to be a master of African-American story quilts and has quilted professionally for more than thirty years. Stephens is proud to have been a part of the "Water is Life" exhibition which opened in 2016 in Geneva, Switzerland; and traveled to France, Italy, Canada, Israel, Mexico and the U.S. Her work has been shown at museums such as The National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky—considered to have one of the world’s top quilt displays—as well as the National Museum of Ghana in Accra. In 2010, Stephens was awarded a resolution by the Georgia House of Representatives for her print portfolio, For Crying Out Loud , a tribute to the Children of the Civil Rights Movement.

I am also sensitive to my surroundings as well as the current environment and culture; however, I always take care to add or include the past. I want to honor the things, people, events, places, and circumstances that shaped the life I get to live freely. I like to remember the sacrifices that were made for me. The most exciting aspect of quilt making is that it is a true learning experience—one that is forever changing. The process changes; it is invented, then re-invented, over and over again. I am most grateful because my life is a very beautiful artistic journey. This thing I refer to as “Story Quilt Making” has been an amazing, adventurous and wonderful ride.

Notable collectors of Stephens’s work include Ric Lewis, Beth Rudin DeWoody, Oprah Winfrey, Arthur Lewis, Samuel L. and LaTanya Jackson, Denzel, and Aretha Franklin. Her work is in the corporate and museum collections of, among others, New York; Citicorp Group, New York; the National Museum of Ghana, and the Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris.