For the past few weeks in my classroom, we have read many books and explored different art forms including poetry, painting and collaging quilts with felt pieces.  This has all been an important part of our recognition and celebration of Black History Month.  While it is a challenge to speak to young children about historical events (including slavery, the Civil War, segregation and civil rights)  it is necessary, and vital to the development of their empathy and understanding.  And children understand what is fair and right, and what is not.  Furthermore, they can be helped to see that in the face of challenges and unfairness people can find their voice and make beauty emerge from the hardest of circumstances – whether it is a quilt that tells the story of a community, a book, or a poem about pride.  It is with great pride that I share what children in my classroom have created, inspired by author Ashley Bryan, poet Mari Evans and the quilters of Gee’s Bend.

“We’ll see the difference a touch of black can make.  Just remember, whatever I do, I’ll be me and you’ll be you.” ~ Ashley Bryan, Beautiful Blackbird

A while back I read Beautiful Blackbird by Ashley Bryan.  I found this book at the library while searching for just the right poem for Black History Month.  When I found Mari Evans’ I Can in a collection of poems for black children it was clear to me how the book and the poem complimented each other.  Finding these beautiful resources, with their messages about pride inspired the lesson plan and related blog post from 2013.  It was a wonderful experience then, and one worth revisiting.  A significant change this time was to have children create a vibrant watercolour painting, and add to it a touch of black, using a chalk pastel, to highlight some of the text from Bryan’s book. Although the classroom poem “I am…. I can….” was created using the same writing prompts from 2013, the children in my class brought their own ideas, voices and expressions of pride to the experience which made the activity new again.  And the result was wonderful.

“Colour on the outside is not what’s on the inside.” ~ Ashley Bryan, Beautiful Blackbird

Our final project – quilts - was the result of a few serendipitous events.  In 2017, when I was working on a quilt project of my own, using Japanese paper stained with watercolour paint, my art teacher brought my attention to the quilts of Gee’s Bend. This became the subject of another blog post.  Soon after that I found a box of fringed fleece squares (in addition to a book about making paper quilts).  Lastly I saw a lovely quilt exhibit at the Textile Museum during the summer of 2018.  I seemed to be receiving all kinds of signs that quilts should be made by the children in my classroom, and this idea has been percolating for a long time, patiently waiting for February, for Black History Month.  The art activity itself was quite simple, and involved glueing felt pieces to the fleece squares after reading the picture book Stitchin’ and Pullin’ by Patricia McKissack.  This beautiful book describes how a young child learns from her family and neighbours how to create a unique quilt and how these quilts have been made for many years, while important historical events took place.  In this simple way, the children in my class learned something about the past, about the talent of the artists of Gee’s Bend, about creating their own patchwork and about the pride that comes with creating something beautiful.

“Just look at your artwork….Only someone with a strong life force could possibly have created that.” ~ Paul Fleischman, Whirligig (1998)

“Our lives are like quilts – bits and pieces, joy and sorrow, stitched with love.” ~ Author Unknown

For a few months now I have been exploring abstract painting. I discovered that I am particularly interested in combining watercolour painting and collage.  I have gotten a lot of support and encouragement from my instructor Gareth Bate and gleaned many ideas from books by Gerald Brommer like Collage Techniques and Watercolor and Collage Workshop.  I went to a specialty shop to buy the genwashi and kozuke papers I needed for staining them with watercolour paint.  Though my first effort was fairly rudimentary – my piece looked like a lopsided quilt made with a simple pinwheel pattern – I learned a lot about this technique, and now feel ready to try something more ambitious.  Gareth asked me if I had ever heard of the quilts of Gee’s Bend.  I had not, so I did an internet search and discovered not only some images of these gorgeous quilts but also an interesting DVD called Why Quilts Matter (which includes a segment on Gee’s Bend).  In addition to learning about the rich history of quilting I found a source of inspiration for future painting projects.  I look forward to starting my next stained paper quilt!

In the midst of all of this I found a lovely picture book by Patricia C.McKissack called Stitchin’ and Pullin’ a Gee’s Bend Quilt.  Illustrated with vibrant paintings by Cozbi A. Cabrera, this book is the story about quilting as an art, as a community and family tradition, and as a chronicle of history.  It is written in lyrical prose from the perspective of a child waiting to be old enough to be taught how to make her first quilt.  She listens as friends and family converse and sing; she watches while women repurpose old clothes, preserving the personal stories associated with each garment; she learns how different colours communicate certain feelings; she sees how assembling the pieces creates “a poem with fabric” and that quilting brings people together.  She also learns about important historical events and people that shaped and influenced the residents of Gee’s Bend (e.g., the march from Selma, the Freedom Quilting Bee, and Dr. Martin Luther King) and how these events were often reflected in the quilts made there.

I found the introduction, written by Matt Arnett, and the author’s note very interesting.
These showed how research on the art of southern African American artists intersected with an author’s efforts to live the experience of those who would be reflected in her book by residing there for a while and being taught how to quilt by Mrs. Mary Lee Bendolph. I really got a sense of the collective commitment to making the reading of this book a special and authentic experience. This was not simply an enjoyable book but one that taught me a lot about the history of Gee’s Bend and the tradition of quilting there and how those quilts gained public attention and deserved recognition as works of art.  McKissack writes, “Our lives are like quilts.  When all the bits and pieces of our remembered history are assembled, they become a link to the past and a beacon for future generations.”  The quilts of Gee’s Bend were a revelation to me.  I hope this book about them provides the inspiration for you that it has for me!