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Stitching Stories of Miracles and Memories

September 19, 2010 - January 2, 2011

Stitching Stories is an exhibition that features embroidered and appliquéd fabric pictures called Cuadros, created by the women of two art cooperatives, Manos Anchashinas and Compacto Humano, located in Pamplona Alta, a shantytown situated on the outskirts of Lima, Peru. Featured in this exhibition are Cuadros representing typical themes produced by the women, as well as a special commissioned project called Miracles and Memories.

For the women artists, the Cuadros serve a variety of purposes. Making and selling the art is an important economic enterprise that provides them with a way to support their families. Cuadros are also an avenue of self-expression, a means to demonstrate artistic skill, and a tangible way to create visual narratives of previous life in the countryside, experiences of migration, and current realities in the shantytowns.  Whether the subjects are pastoral or political in nature, women depict themselves as integral members of their families and important participants in the events that shape their communities. With bits of cloth, textured fabric, and colored thread, the women of Pamplona Alta stitch together stories that underscore transitions in their lives. Illuminate episoded of generosity in a Peruvian shantytown make us attentive to the deeper meanings of joy and abundance.

This on-going project is conducted by Rebecca Berru Davis, a doctoral student at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California. For more information please contact Rebecca Berru Davis at berrumt@yahoo.com or see www.ConVida.org.

Programming for Stitching Stories of Miracles and Memories is made possible in part with support from the Traverse Area Chamber of Commerce’s Dennos Global Diversity project and the cooperation of Notre Dame University.