(soothing music) - [Narrator] What pictures can you make from these shapes?

When you move these shapes around and change the colors, do they mean different things?

There are many artists in Alabama that use shapes and colors to make all kinds of interesting art, including a group of women from the area of Gee's Bend, Alabama, who used them to decorate quilts.

Their use of squares and rectangles was so inspiring, that they can be seen in the designs used to decorate the dress that former First Lady Michelle Obama wore in her official portrait.

How did the art from Gee's Bend end up on Michelle Obama's dress?

Gee's Bend is a long way from the White House in Washington DC, and even if you live in Alabama, it can be difficult to get to.

It is in a big curve, or bend, in the Alabama river, and there is only one road you can take to get there.

But if you need to cross the river to get to Gee's Bend, then you have to take a ferry.

Imagine that!

You must take a boat to get to a town in Alabama.

But before we had cars or ferries, people traveled by horse, which was a lot slower.

So back then, the people who lived in Gee's Bend were a little isolated from the rest of the state.

Because they were by themselves, they would grow their own food and make their own quilts to keep warm at night.

The quilts they made were something special.

Art helped keep people warm.

The first quilts from Gee's Bend were made because the people who lived there did not have enough money to buy new quilts.

They took worn out clothes and cut them up into rectangles, squares, and triangles, which they sewed together in interesting patterns to make colorful quilts.

The old clothes became new quilts.

Have you ever thought that you could make a work of art from an old pair of pants?

The quilters of Gee's Bend been learned this from their parents who learned from their parents, who learned it from their parents, going back over 100 years to a time when many of the people in Gee's Bend were enslaved.

This is in an area of Alabama where the soil is so rich and dark that it is called The Black Belt.

The dark black soil was good for growing crops like cotton, and 100 years ago, much of Gee's Bend was the Pettway Plantation.

The enslaved people that worked on the plantation had very little and learned to make quilts from old clothes because they had little else to make them from.

They were so creative with their quilts.

One creative pattern was a group of triangles in the shape of a star.

Stories from the time of slavery say that this was a reminder of how to find the North Star, which would point them to freedom.

The quilts could do more than keep them warm.

The quilts tell stories of Gee's Bend.

When slavery ended, many people that worked on the Pettway Plantation stayed in Gee's Bend.

They continued to make quilts that used patterns of squares, rectangles, and triangles, to make abstract pictures of things around them.

Abstract means that the picture doesn't look exactly like what it is supposed to be, but makes you think about it.

Many quilters in Gee's Bend use this abstract pattern.

What does it make you think of?

(gentle music) It is called "Rooftop" because it has the same pattern as a roof.

Here are some other abstract patterns the quilters use.

This one looks like a window.

Imagine that you're looking out of a window in Gee's Bend.

This one is called "School."

Does it make you think about your school?

♪ Swing low, sweet chariot ♪ ♪ Comin' to carry me home ♪ - [Narrator] The quilters think about many things when they arrange their shapes into patterns.

They pray and sing church hymns while quilting to help them think and be creative.

Quilters have taught this way of quilting to their daughters so singing while quilting is still heard in Gee's Bend today.

The quilts and the way they are made have become so popular that now the whole world admires these colorful works of art.

Art introduced Gee's Bend to the world.

Back in 1966, 60 quilters from across Alabama's Black Belt, including Gee's Bend, wanted to use their quilts to make money to help support themselves and their community.

They worked together and formed the Freedom Quilting Bee.

This was called a cooperative, because all of the quilters shared in both the work and the money that was made.

They were so successful that eventually people all over the United States began to buy their quills.

People wanted them because they were both warm and colorful artworks.

The abstract patterns of Gee's Bend made people around the world think of all kinds of interesting things.

Some people even think that the patterns in the quilts are similar to paintings done by a famous Dutch artist named Piet Mondrian.

Do you think they're similar?

The quilts and quilters of Gee's Bend have become famous worldwide.

They have used old clothes cut into squares, rectangles, and triangles to show what beautiful things are in Alabama's Black Belt.

Starting with next to nothing, they have given the world something beautiful.

And that is why Michelle Obama was proud to wear bold patterns like the one seen in Gee's Bend quilts on her dress in her official portrait as First Lady of the United States of America.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues)