The community in our physical vicinity is the community we have to rely on to keep each other safe, to make change, and lean on in a crisis. How do we connect to them more at a time when we are increasingly isolated from each other? For this project, several sites around the Darbo-Worthington neighborhood in Madison are hosting the 13 banners I made with help from the community. Each banner has an independent line of text, and together the text makes up a more whole piece of writing, all with the goal of connection. It is my hope that within these words, we can expand our own capacity for care, togetherness and justice.
It took a few months to make these banners. During sewing bees, discussions of grief, inequity and LOVE bubbled up while our hands kept busy. We slowly secured cotton letters to soft, worn bed sheets. A couple people took squares of sheets home, spreading the work out into private spaces around the city. One helper added extra squares from her stash when she noticed I had miscounted for a couple rows, choosing fabric that perfectly complemented the color palette. A dear friend took banners with letters pinned on to the Creator’s Cottage and it passed through several hands before being completed by another artist while watching a quilter speak at the central library. The same friend took another banner to a soccer game with family and taught her young nieces to sew. I took banners on multiple trips to Atlanta to care for a friend, sewing quietly as she rested, meditating on my hopes for her recovery with every stitch. I helped to host a memorial gathering for an artist that recently died, and nearly 30 people helped sew letters on that evening, including the artists’ partner and father.
At this point, I’m not sure how many people have helped. I am sure, though, that nothing could have completed this work except community. We are nothing without each other.
THE SUN WILL FIND US
SMALL SPROUTS SEEKING
ROOTS WILL SECURE US
HANDS CLASPED
RETURN PROTECTION
LOVE IS FEROCIOUS
GATES WILL CRUMBLE
WE WILL REACH YOU
AN EXCAVATION OF LOVE
THE SUN WILL FIND US
Thank yous and more info below:
There are pamphlets going out into pretty little boxes in front of each site and should be filled now! There’s a secret site, too…Look for it in Reger Park. Gratitude to every single person that helped by donating sheets, time and care to this work. Finding the sites for the banners was a group effort, and I am thankful to site hosts for offering their space as a part of the work. Thank you to the Madison Arts Commission, the Bubbler at Madison Public Library, the Town of Blooming Grove, the City of Madison, for making the Thurber Park Artist Residency possible. I planned this project as a part of the Terrain Biennial. The 2021 Terrain Biennial was when I displayed my first banner, and I am happy to have so many as a part of their event again this year.
You can sneak a peek at more photos of banners at my instagram post here, or sign up for my email newsletter at the bottom of my home page to get a more full background when I send out my next newsletter soon.
SAVE THE DATE for Sunday, November 9, 2-5pm when we will spend time at Thurber Park to celebrate and thank everyone involved in making this project come to life. 💜
Above, a close-up of one of the banners on a porch on Memphis Avenue.
