Read a wonderful article from the Staten Island Advance about art and music teacher Emily Ellison and her year-long curriculum to teach various aspects of African arts and crafts to PS31 third, forth, and fifth graders. They have learned about African masks, weaving, embroidery and quilting. The class visited the Sandy Ground Historical Society Museum to see African American quilts there. They are now making a class quilt with each student stitching their own block. According to the article, teacher Ellison challenged the students to consider:"What kind of design represents you the best? What if someone found our quilt 500 years from now? What will your design say about you?What a wonderful classroom experience! Are there similar programs in your community? Enjoy!
One of our goals is to keep the tradition of African American quilting alive in our community. We know the importance of history and to that end, we have tried to keep a record of our guild history: exhibits, group and individual awards, special recognitions, etc. To have a more permanent, lasting record of who we are, we decided to publish our own book. We also have a guild membership with the Alliance for American Quilts and will have an official workshop on February 9th to learn the process for recording, preserving, and sharing our oral histories entitled "Quilters' S-O-S. - Save Our Stories." It is important to preserve our history for our present family but particularly for future generations.
Such a project requires MONEY. To have someone publish it for us was much too expensive so a member researched self publication. A small group of members designed and created a quilt for which all members sold a given number of raffle tickets. The profit from the raffle served as seed money for the printing.
Every member was invited to participate in the book project for a fee based on the number of pages they would have in the book. The monies collected covered the expenses of the photographer, the layout and graphic designer, the actual printing of the book, securing of title and ISBN registrations, and provided each participant with one copy of the book. Additional copies were printed with monies from the treasury and prepaid orders from the membership. Over several sessions, members were scheduled to have their pictures taken with their quilts; a few retakes had to be done. Members were required to write their own information...what they wanted to say about themselves and their work.....with only AAQC members doing everything except the layout and photographs ..., we are PROUD!
We printed what we could afford to pay for as payment was required IN ADVANCE of printing. We did not know how well the book would be received so we had to move with caution. ... The profit from the book sales will go into our treasury.
Yes, absolutely, even if not on the scale that we did it.I have one of the books! Its splashes of color provide you with the personalities of the quilters and their work. Nancy Cash was the project director; Veronica Hicks the project assistant (no, I don't think Veronica and I are related :> ). Editors included Marjorie Diggs Freeman, Rosiland Morrow Wallace, and Veronica Cartwright. The front cover photograph was by Sistah Quilter Sauda Zahra.
Does your guild create Storybook Quilts? Are there kid lit titles you think would make a great quilt? I'd love to hear from you!
Update: My Julaine's pin cushion (photo right) came in the mail. It's GREAT! Fast shipping. The band automatically stays curled around your wrist.
What other items should we as quilters consider?
When I researched the materials for Black Threads, I uncovered 585 African American-made quilts in 100 museum collections. The hundred museums and contact information are listed in the book.
Without donations ... and museum purchases!.... of our quilts - who will know our fabric stories in 100 years?
