Carolyn Mazloomi, Madam C. J. Walker, 2025, 76 x 77.5 inches, cotton fabric, cotton batt, poly-cotton thread, India ink; printed, stenciled, hand painting, machine quilted
A Powerful Kick Off to a Stellar 2026 Gallery Program Celebrating The Work and Friendship of Two Pathbreaking Artists
On View January 9 – March 7, 2026
Claire Oliver Gallery is pleased to announce Certain Restrictions Do Apply, a landmark two-person textile exhibition featuring new works by artists Carolyn Mazloomi and Sharon Kerry-Harlan. On view from January 9–March 7, 2026, the exhibition presents 9 new artworks and inaugurates the gallery’s 2026 program. The exhibition celebrates decades of friendship and collaboration between the two artists; both Mazloomi and Kerry-Harlan mine the history of Black American pioneers and expand the narrative and formal possibilities of quiltmaking and textile art.
Though distinct in approach, Mazloomi and Kerry-Harlan share a commitment to storytelling through fiber, exploring race, culture, memory, and belonging. Their works reposition quilting not as domestic craft or woman’s work but as a powerful conceptual and political practice. The two artists have also been close friends for decades, sharing conversations, critiques, and creative support that have shaped their respective journeys — making their first New York presentation together both professionally significant and personally meaningful.
“Textiles have an inherent humanity,” said Carolyn Mazloomi. “A quilt holds touch, time, labor, and story — it holds lives. The histories of the people I depict are sewn into the fabric itself. Quilts speak on behalf of those whose voices might otherwise go unheard.”
“Memory is layered,” said Sharon Kerry-Harlan. “In fabric, I find the ability to embed echoes — of family, of the past, of cultural inheritance. My work is about carrying forward what must not be forgotten, but also making space for reinterpretation.”
Mazloomi’s artistic practice is deeply rooted in textile history, social documentation and activism. She is the founder of the African American Quilt Guild of Los Angeles and the Women of Color Quilters Network, has authored numerous significant publications, and is shaping the national discourse around quilting as a respected contemporary art form. Likewise, Kerry-Harlan brings a unique material sensibility: her rust-dyed surfaces, pattern language, and incorporation of found fabrics create visual fields where ancestry and cosmopolitan rhythm coexist.
“Carolyn and Sharon are among the most important narrative textile artists working today,” said Claire Oliver, founder of Claire Oliver Gallery. “This exhibition honors not only their individual legacies, but the creative dialogue and mutual trust between them. Their friendship and artistic respect for one another amplify the power of the work, and we are proud to present this historic first joint exhibition in New York.”
Together, their works form a visual conversation, not only between artwork and viewer, but between two women who have influenced one another’s practices, celebrated each other’s achievements, and remain connected by a shared purpose: to preserve histories and affirm identity through the language of stitched and constructed cloth.
ABOUT CAROLYN MAZLOOMI
Based in West Chester, Ohio, Carolyn Mazloomi is an artist, curator, and writer. Her practice is rooted in the quilting tradition, using textiles—a personal and metaphorical material—to communicate the stories of individuals who have made significant contributions to social justice and landmark events that have shaped American history. She is the founder of the African American Quilt Guild of Los Angeles and the Women of Color Quilters Network, and a former board member of the Studio Art Quilt Associates and Alliance for American Quilters. Over the course of her career, Mazloomi has had solo exhibitions at institutions and galleries across the country including the Los Angeles Folk Art Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Kenyon College, Gambier, OH; Kent State University, Kent, OH; Malcom Brown Gallery, Shaker Heights, OH; University of Michigan, Institute for Research on Women and Gender, Ann Arbor, MI; and Quilters Hall of Fame, Marion, IN.
Mazloomi’s work is in the public collections of the American Folk Art Museum, New York, NY; Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, Birmingham, AL; Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, OH; Cleveland Public Library, Cleveland, OH; Museum of Fine Art, Boston, MA; Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN; Museum of Art and Design, New York, NY; National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, TN; National Endowment for the Arts Washington, D.C.; Quilters Hall of Fame Museum, Madison, IN; The Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Smithsonian Museum of African American Culture and History, Washington, D.C., among others. Mazloomi is the author of several books, and has most recently published Visioning Human Rights in the New Millennium (2019), Yours for Race and Country: Reflections on the Life of Colonel Charles Young (2019), We Who Believe in Freedom (2020), We Are the Story: A Visual Response to Racism (2021), and Black Pioneers: Legacy in the American West (2022).
ABOUT SHARON KERRY-HARLAN
Sharon Kerry-Harlan (b. 1951, Miami, FL) is a visual artist living and working between Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, and Hollywood, Florida. Raised in a family of artists, Harlan learned quilting from her mother and elements of design and abstraction from her uncle, an artist and designer. She integrates traditional quilting techniques with contemporary approaches to fabric manipulation to create her signature ‘rust-dyed’, monochromatic large-scale textile works for which she is celebrated.
Kerry-Harlan’s textile work, mixed-media collages, paintings, and figurative objects—such as the Black Eyed Pea dolls—are deeply informed by race, history, and the socio-political landscape. Her artistic practice centers on designing her own textile patterns and fabrics, sometimes incorporating found and inherited materials into her compositions that balance geometric forms, figurative elements, and intricate patterns. Inspired by her African diasporic heritage, the rhythm of modern metropolitan life, and the interplay between historical narratives and contemporary events, Kerry-Harlan positions herself as a keeper and translator of information and histories, crafting visual narratives that convey multifaceted perspectives. Her work transcends temporal boundaries, fostering a dialogue that bridges the past and present.
Sharon Kerry-Harlan holds a BA from Marquette University and studied art at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, both located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Her work is part of the permanent collection at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and she has exhibited at numerous national and international institutions, including the Harn Museum (Gainesville, FL), the Racine Art Museum (Racine, WI), the Erie Art Museum (Erie, PA), the National Afro-American Museum and Cultural Center (Wilberforce, OH), and the California State Museum (Sacramento, CA), among others.
ABOUT CLAIRE OLIVER GALLERY
Claire Oliver Gallery is located in Central Harlem in a four-story brownstone. For nearly 25 years, Claire Oliver Gallery has showcased and celebrated artwork, with a focus on work by women and people of color, which transcends and challenges the traditional art historical canon. The gallery’s forward-thinking program and exclusive commitment to the primary market allows for an intensive focus that has nurtured and grown the careers of our artists. Many of the gallery’s artists have been included in The Venice Biennale, The Whitney Biennial, and biennales in Sydney, Pittsburgh, and Lyon and have exhibited works in major international museums including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Art Institute of Chicago, Centre Georges Pompidou, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, and The Los Angeles County Museum of Art amongst others. Claire Oliver Gallery artists are included in the permanent collections of many important museums worldwide including The Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Art Institute of Chicago, The Tate Britain, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The State Hermitage Museum, MoMA, and the Museum of Arts and Design amongst many others. Claire Oliver Gallery held the first American exhibition for the Russian collaborative AES+F, whose work went on to twice represent Russia in the Russian pavilion of the Venice Biennale. Gallery artists have received prestigious fellowships including Fulbright, Guggenheim, USArtist and National Endowment for the Arts.
Claire Oliver Gallery, 2288 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard, New York, NY 10030
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