The Skin Quilt Project features quilt historian Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi discussing her journey into researching and documenting contemporary African American quilts.
The Skin Quilt Project
About The Skin Quilt Project:
The Skin Quilt Project is a documentary that explores colorism in the African-American community. The film addresses this complex issue through the stories of African-American quilters, and the tradition of an artform that celebrates its culture. The quilters speak of the influence of the African-American quilting tradition as a tool for encouraging an appreciation in the African-American cultural heritage.
Colorism has been a long disputed issue within the African-American community, however, filmmaker Lauren Cross speculates that African-American quilters are much more grounded in their African roots. As Quilt historian Carolyn Mazloomi explains, African-American quilters "are joined by the thread of a needle” in which the quilting medium leaves no room for “color issues.”
As many African-American quilters come from families who have passed down quilting techniques to their children and grandchildren, today’s quilters represent African-American men and women who have become concerned with telling the story of their cultural heritage. In The Skin Quilt Project, the quilters tell the story of skin color politics in African-American culture, yet realizing the power of quilting to empower self-confidence in their community.
About the Artist:
Lauren Cross is a writer, activist, and interdisciplinary artist working in mixed media, photography, media arts, and installation art. Her current research interests include the issues of colorism and the “color complex” within the African American community, and her current work addresses ideals of beauty, race, and skin complexion in media imagery. She is also the founder and editor of CVAAD Projects( www.cvaad.com), an online blog and resource for contemporary visual art of the African diaspora. She received her BA in Art, Design, and Media from Richmond, The American International University in London, England, and MFA in Visual Arts from the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University, Cambridge, MA.
For more information,
please contact us at:
info@skinquiltproject.com
Quilting and Participant Links:
www.artbysshine.com
www.wendellgeorgebrown.net
http://blackthreads.blogspot.com
www.bluetrianglequiltguild.com
www.africanamericanartquilt.com
http://auburn.edu/academic/other
/geesbend/home.html
www.carolynlmazloomi.com/
http://richerichardsonartquilts.blogspot.com/
www.myspace.com/darianurbangriot
www.myspace.com/mahoganylbrowne
The Skin Quilt Project featured in Glimpse Journal’s Color issue!
Check out Page 78-81 to read about Director, Lauren Cross and The Skin Quilt Project in Glimpse Journal!
Director of Music and composer for The Skin Quilt Project, Solomon Cross!
Introducing the official Director of Music & Composer for The Skin Quilt Project score, Solomon Cross. Solomon Cross is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts where he received his Masters in Music,and the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston in Houston,Texas where he earned his bachelors. He will be releasing his debut album, Be Free on November 27, 2009. Only 4 days left to pre-order your copy for only $10! Feel free to check out his website( www.solomoncrossonline.com) for more details.
African American Quilting Scholars in The Skin Quilt Project!
The Skin Quilt Project will be interviewing two of the most cutting-edge African American quilting scholars of today, Ms. Kyra Hicks (Arlington,VA) and Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi( West Chester, OH). Both have contributed extensively to the development of writings on the African American quilting tradition, as well as elevating the history and stories of the African-American quilters that they feature.
Kyra Hicks is the author of Black Threads: An African American Quilting Sourcebook(2003), Martha Ann’s Quilt for Queen Victoria(2006), and her recently published book This I Accomplish: Harriet Powers’ Bible Quilt and Other Pieces(2009).
Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi is the author of Spirits of the Cloth: Contemporary African American Quilts(1998); Textural Rhythms: Quilting the Jazz Tradition(Paper Moon Publications, 2007); and Quilting African American Women’s History: Our Creativity, Champions and Challenges(Paper Moon Publications, 2008). She is also an independent curator of exhibitions such as Threads of Faith(2004); Quilting African American Women’s History: Our Creativity, Champions and Challenges(2008); and she also assisted curator, Roland Freeman with the inaugural exhibition, Quilts for Obama: Celebrating the Inaugration of our 44th President. Dr. Mazloomi is the founder of the Women of Color Quilters Network, an organization built to foster and preserve the art of quiltmaking among women of color. Her new book The Journey of Hope in America: Art Quilts Inspired by Presideny Barack Obama is scheduled for release in December 2009. The Skin Quilt Project participant Sherry Shine’s art Quilt is featured on the cover.
Quilting in South Carolina and the Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor!
What a treat we’re in for during on the upcoming trip to South Carolina, with an amazing lineup of African American and Gullah quilters!
To give you an introduction, the Gullah/Geechee culture is one of the most-defined groups of African Americans who have managed to maintain a strong connection to their African roots, some of their tools of expression being basket-weaving and quilting traditions! The Gullah/Geechee cultural presence can be traced from the coasts of North Carolina all the way down to Jacksonville, Florida. To find out more about the Gullah/Geechee culture check out the link to the Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor.
There is also a great rooted history of the African American culture in places like Charleston and Georgetown, South Carolina leading back to the transportation of slaves from Africa. I’ve often heard about the historic slave market in Charleston, but in the context of The Skin Quilt Project it has new meaning. If anyone has ever read the book, Hidden in Plain View: A Secret Story of Quilts and the Underground Railroad( Jacqueline L. Tobin and Raymond G. Dobard, Ph.D) you know exactly what I mean. The story is about a woman in Charleston, SC who revealed a secret code used in the underground railroad during slavery. It’s a fascinating and thought provoking book that suggests the cultural connections between the history of the African American quilting tradition, slavery, and the Underground railroad. Despite it’s interesting points, the theories in the book have also been questioned by many scholars and historians as they debate whether there was truly a “secret code” during slavery. Where it’s true or not it’s certainly an interesting take on the African American quilting tradition.
During the upcoming trip we will also be visiting a variety of historical sites that will allow us to visualize the history of the African American experience in the south.
We’re excited to be interviewing quilters Wendell George Brown, Cookie Washington, Vermelle “Bunny” Rodrigues at the Gullah Museum, and Dorothy Montgomery. Please stay tuned for more updates on what we found!
0 This post is tagged with: Gullah Geechee Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor South Carolina slavery slave trade African Africanslaves quilting African heritage slaver market
The Skin Quilt Project featured in Glimpse Journal’s Color issue!
Stay tuned to the upcoming “Color” issue of the Glimpse Journal, an interdisciplinary journal that examines the functions, processes, and effects of vision and its implications for being, knowing, and constructing our world(s). Director of The Skin Quilt Project, Lauren Cross has contributed a essay to the Glimpse vol 2.3, Color issue detailing the conception of the documentary and her personal experiences with colorism. Check out the posting on the project on the Glimpse Journal blog!
On the set with The Skin Quilt Project!
On the set of The Skin Quilt Project with Dr. Midge Wilson, Professor of Psychology and Associate Dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences at DePaul University(Chicago, IL), quilter Mrs. Auian Ward featuring her beautiful wealth of quilts(Houston, Texas), and artist Carolyn Crump in the studio( Houston, Texas).
Photo credits:
Photos of Mrs. Auian Ward and Carolyn Crump by Lauren Cross
Photos of Dr. Midge Wilson by Jewelette Christopher
Spoken Word poets featured in The Skin Quilt Project!
The Skin Quilt Project will feature the collaborative work of New York poets Mahogany Browne and Darian Dauchan performing a new poem about the African American quilting tradition. I’m so excited about what they’ve put together, they are both notable poets( and performers) who have spread their artistry across the country and we’re honored to have them apart of the project. Be sure to check out their work on myspace.com!
Mahogany Browne: www.myspace.com/mahoganylbrowne
Darian Dauchan: www.myspace.com/darianurbangriot
Check out the teaser for The Skin Quilt Project (www.skinquiltproject.com).This clip features quilters Carolyn Crump, Dr. Madeline Wright, The Blue Triangle Quilt Guild of Houston, Texas, and Aundrea Matthews, Ph.d candidate from Rice University, Houston, Texas. Director, Lauren Cross —2.53 minutes
Skin Quilt Project featuring Dr. Midge Wilson and Kathy Russell, two of three co-authors of “The Color Complex: The Politics of Skin Color Among African Americans.”
Anyone who has done any significant research on colorism in the African American community would have had to run into this book, The Color Complex: The Politics of Skin Color Among African Americans. In the two years that I’ve researched the topic of colorism in the African American community I found their text to be one of the most helpful and most objective, of course there are a number of great books out there, but I found their perspective to convey both the emotions behind the topic as well as really looking at the subject as not victim or blame but by tracing the origins of these ideas and how its taken affect in the lives of different people. I would encourage anyone interested in digging deeper into this subject to read this book.
I will have the pleasure to meet with both Dr. Midge Wilson and Kathy Russell in Chicago, IL within the next couple of weeks to talk about the issues of colorism in the African American community, and even more specifically how far we’ve come since they originally wrote their book in 1992.
