Quilting for Social Justice workshop at MICA!

Hi everyone! This is Sara - one of Dr. Gaither's graduate art education students at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). I am excited to share with you some images from a quilting workshop that Dr. Gaither facilitated two weeks ago to a group of Graduate Art Education and Community Arts student at MICA.

The title of the workshop was "Quilting for Social Justice", and was an opportunity for us to see examples of Dr. Gaither's work, hear about her thought process (as well as artistic quilting process), and experiment with quilting materials. Ultimately, all of the participants left with ideas that we plan to implement in our classrooms and community centers this coming semester as we complete our student teaching and community-based internships. The resulting student work will be part of a display at MICA in April to coincide with the National Art Education Association's (NAEA) 2010 National Conference, titled "Art Education and Social Justice".

To begin, we brainstormed the meaning of the words "Social Justice" and then created a list of topics that all fit under that theme and could be used in a quilt project.Here's a close up of some of the ideas and thoughts that we came up with:
We then each chose a topic to focus on - some of the topics were: family roles, identity, idiosyncrasies, health care reform, women's rights, literacy, teenage culture and more. We discussed our ideas with our fellow workshop participants, sketched out a few ideas on paper, and then were "let loose" to dig through bins of colorful material and embellishments to design our our quilt squares.Here are some photos of some of the participants working on their quilt squares:



At the end of the two day workshop, we shared our in-progress quilt squares, and had a discussion on how to implement a "Quilting for Social Justice" themed art unit in our own classrooms and community centers. It was great to see all of the different issues people chose to address and the different quilt-making techniques each person used. Dr. Gaither has inspired us to bring this kind of art-making experience to our students - I can't wait to see what they come up with!


Keep an eye out for a post with more information on the gallery show - the NAEA National Conference will be in Baltimore in mid-April, and the show will be up at MICA during the week of the conference. We hope to see you there!

New Workshop and Exhibit!

I am pleased to announce details for a new Quilting from the Soul workshop as well as a new exhibition of Dr. Gaither's work. Information is below.

The My American Series blog posting series will start this weekend. I send my apologies for being a week late but technology issues (read dying computer) prevented my posting. Speaking of posting, I would like to point out the last two posts were in fact Dr. Gaither posting and not me posting on her behalf. Look for more posts from the artist herself in the coming months!

Picturing the Promise - Making Photo and Memory Quilts
Saturday, 27 February 2010
10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Lamond-Riggs Public Library
5401 South Dakota Ave., NE
Washington, DC
Free. Registration not required.
For more information, call 202.633.0070 or 202.541.6255.
This program is hosted by the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Participants learn to take the first step in assembling story-telling quilts by creating their own quilt squares using personal images and text. The workshop is led by documentary quilt maker Joan M. E. Gaither of the Maryland Institute College of Art. Prior quilting experience is not required. Participants are invited to bring personal photos to scan onto their quilt squares.


Exhibition of Dr. Gaither's Family Quilt, I Am
February 1, 2010-February 28, 2010
Barnes & Noble Booksellers
2516 Solomon's Island Rd.
Annapolis, MD 21401

Dr. Gaither will give a lecture at the bookstore on her style of quilting on 14 February 2010. I will post the time as soon as I have it.

J2WH and Homage to Ed & Sylvia Brown Quilts at Hartford City Hall

The Hartford Connecticut City Hall makes a majestic setting for two of the quilts in My American Quilts Series and five more quilts included in the Community Threads quilt project. Homage to Ed & Sylvia Brown celebrates the $15 million philanthropic gift from the African American couple to numerous cultural institutions of Baltimore Maryland. This had all the makings of a story that I felt needed to be shared. In addition to the $6 million gift to Maryland Institute College of Art, the couple gave $1 million to the local art museums, symphony, public library, and organizations that offer positive opportunities for at-risk children.

A few architectural columns away is Journey to the White House quilt. While I was touring the Community Threads multiple venues, at City Hall I was reminded by several employees and three visitors at the time that J2WH inspired them and gave them hope. In the photo on the left, Carolyn Thomas, Greater Hartford Chapter of Links, Inc., is seen pointing to the section on the J2WH quilt that acknowledges Barack Obama accepting the nomination on the anniversary of Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech.

Thank You to My Ever-Growing Community

Let me first say thank you to my ever-growing communities of supporters and participants in our shared stories stitched and attached to the quilts in My American Series. I have always been mindful that the work one does in the community becomes a model for others to follow. In the metropolitan Baltimore/Annapolis area, whatever success I've achieved working with quilts in the community ties to a strong collaboration and partnership with the Banneker-Douglass Museum in Annapolis, Maryland, Northern Arundel Cultural Preservation Society, Inc., and now the Blacks of the Chesapeake Foundation. I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge and thank BDM's own technical/computer/PR guru Genevieve Kaplan, who has created and maintained the on-going posts of the quilts' journey and who has scheduled, promoted, and helped me to facilitate quilt workshops at the museum and throughout the region.

Before My American Series began its national tour in Hartford, Connecticut, the sixth quilt in the series, the Black Watermen of the Chesapeake Bay was launched during an exceptionally well-planned and highly attended dedication reception. The emotionally charged day remains memorable as I reflect upon the strength and power of shared knowing and celebration of the black watermen's rich contributions to the history and culture of the American story of entrepreneurship, work, life, and leisure on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland.

I also extend a heartfelt thank you to the Greater Hartford Chapter of Links for featuring a special exhibition of my quilts with particular focus on Gordon, a healing quilt for a Hartford, Connecticut native son, celebrating a life too soon gone. I'm honored to have had the opportunity to see the Hartford Stage production of Gee's Bend Quilts, have my quilts be extended for the run of the show, and to be one of the many quilters taking part in Community Threads quilt project throughout the city of Hartford. This is a grass roots quilting project that seeks to honor the stories and handiworks of diverse quilters that help us to see how we are linked past to present and inextricably linked within our ongoing history, our smaller communities in particular, and to the larger community in general.

Look for a future posting of the six documentary story quilts in My American Series and my travels to eighteen of the twenty-three venues that showcase 100+ quilts in the Community Threads exhibition. Homage to Ed & Sylvia Brown, the first in the series, acknowledges and celebrates the $15 million gift to the cultural institutions in Baltimore. The Brown Quilt and Journey to the White House have been installed at Hartford's City Hall. The Conrad Mallett Gallery exhibits three Maryland story quilts: Trails Tracks Tarmac, Friendship-BWI-Thurgood Marshall Airport, and the Black Watermen of the Chesapeake Bay. At Freedom's Door: Challenging Slavery in Maryland will go on exhibition at the Hartford Public Library during Black History Month. If you find yourself in the Hartford area, pick up a brochure that is located in the exhibition spaces or check out the project blog at http://www.community-threads.com/.

Happy Anniversary J2WH!

Believe it or not, today is the one year anniversary of the completion of the Journey to the White House quilt. It doesn't seem possible that it has already been a year. What seems even more impossible to me is all the extraordinary events that have occurred in the year since. A few days ago Dr. Gaither and I were talking while she was in Connecticut for the opening of the Gee's Bend play and debut of her works in Hartford mulling over this very thought.

One year ago today at this very moment (2:04 p.m.), J2WH was being finished, the last beads being sewn on, pieces being secured, and final stitches put in place. We were preparing for a 6 week exhibition of the work and sharing the details of the public quilting sessions on this blog. The final number of people who worked on the quilt whether it was at the public quilting sessions, private sessions at Dr. Gaither's home and work space, and a few other locations and events came in somewhere between 650 and 700. The quilt was featured in several local media outlets and picked up and carried in newspapers throughout the country. Everyone was extremely proud, and rightfully so, of the work that went into J2WH. As I mentioned in earlier posts, there are memories I have of the quilting events that will never leave my mind. Beyond memories, are the emotions that went through the rooms of the quilting sessions. Watching the sheer number of people who came (in droves) to participate, to watch, to listen, and to learn was beyond our wildest expectations. This is something I am learning to expect when it comes to working with Dr. Gaither. Expect the unexpected and don't ever assume anything.

In the year since J2WH debuted:

• The J2WH exhibition at the Banneker-Douglass Museum was extended from 6 weeks to 9 months
• There is a national tour of Dr. Gaither's work in progress
• The quilt picked up a "friend" while at the museum in the form of a student generated portrait of President Obama
• This blog has been read by over 2,800 people from 20+ countries around the world with nearly 50% of the visitation in the United States coming from people outside of Maryland
• The press coverage of Dr. Gaither and her work has increased exponentially
• Interest in bringing her work to venues throughout the US and a few countries in other parts of the globe is coming in fast and furious
• The number of workshops and requests for Dr. Gaither to teach others how to do the type of quilting she does are pouring in with each request getting more involved and encompassing greater numbers of people
• The number of people who have seen J2WH numbers around 10,000
• J2WH is no longer the newest quilt in the My American Series

Quite a list of changes and those are just the few I have in the forefront of my mind. I am sure if I spent some greater time thinking about the quilt, I could come up with several others. I have proposed doing a "One Year Later" retrospective with Dr. Gaither on camera to add to the blog. I have some footage of Dr. Gaither I shot over the past year with J2WH that I have not shared here which I will add, including reading comments left in the quilt journal and reactions to the public outpouring of support and interest in this quilt. Hopefully we will be able to take some time in the coming weeks and create the retrospective which will be posted here.

Please share with us your memories of J2WH whether it be of your time working on the quilt, the first time you saw it, your favorite part of the quilt, etc. Documenting and sharing stories is what these quilts are all about and we want to continue that tradition here. Leave us a comment on this posting or send us an email at ObamaCommunityQuilt@gmail.com.

In the time it has taken me to type this post, the 1 year anniversary of J2WH being hung for exhibition on the walls of the Banneker-Douglass Museum has occurred.

Happy Anniversary J2WH, Dr. Gaither, and the whole J2WH community!

Last minute quilting...again

Just when I thought there would be some down time and Dr. Gaither would be able to work on her quilts at a more reasonable pace, I was proven wrong. The final component of the Gee's Bend quilts is being worked on as I type. This quilt is full of storytelling and family as all of her quilts are, this time focusing on Dr. Gaither's mother and siblings. The quilt incorporates images of her family, stories of each of her many siblings interacting with their mother, and imagery that symbolizes each one of her siblings. It very much reflects the type of teaching methods she uses to inspire people when getting started on their quilt squares during her workshops. It has been interesting watching the quilt come together over the past few weeks and listening to the stories told the work moves forward.

The quilt will be finished tomorrow as Dr. Gaither travels to Hartford. If you are catching the train from Baltimore to Hartford, CT tomorrow, be on the lookout for someone working on a quilt. IF you are in the Hartford area, please go and check out the quilts.

Hartford, CT Exhibition of Dr. Gaither's Work

Happy New Year! I hope everyone out there is enjoying a good start to the new year and keeping busy. I can certainly say we are busy on this end. Today will be a quick posting, but I promise to write a lengthier post series starting next week on Dr. Gaither's My American Series (MAS). With all of the talk about the series, I thought it would be nice to give each of the quilts their due and explore each one of them.

In the mean time, the Community Threads exhibition in Hartford, CT, which includes Dr. Gaither's My American Series and several other of her works, opened last week with great success. The exhibition has formed it's own blog in the past week. You can visit it at http://www.community-threads.com/. Her works are in three locations around Hartford. The Brown's Quilt (the first in the series) and J2WH are on display in Hartford's City Hall. The other quilts in the MAS are on display at the Capital Community College. The Gee's Bend inspired quilts along with a few others will be on display that Hartford Stage during the run of the production of Gee's Bend. Dr. Gaither herself will be on hand for the opening of the show later this week. Be sure to say hello if you see her.

I am including a link from the Hartford Courant here that shows the installation of the Brown's Quilt and J2WH at the City Hall building. Note the quilt on the floor in the lower right-hand corner on the first picture. The first time I looked at the photo, I knew there was something familiar about it, but it took me a few minutes to figure out what that was. Suddenly I recognized the fabric colors and realized I knew that quilt. It is interesting how viewing things in a new context or environment can change your perspective. Can you figure out which one it is?

Enjoy! The My American Series (MAS) weekly series will start next week.

Hartford Courant images:
http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-community-threads-quilt-exhibition-pictures,0,2355069.photogallery