TEXT BY ARTISTS INSPIRED BY MADE BLANKETS.
Each blanket was made by a woman or collective with the intention of capturing a visual message against violence against women, girls and Mother Earth. In addition to the messages on the blankets, the artists included - in certain cases - texts, descriptions or sensations from the pieces produced. So in this space those messages are shared that can be linked according to the numbering of each blanket.
TEXTS OF THE ARTISTS
BLANKET 3 TABLE 6
"In Life and Death United", Gina Hyams, United States / San Miguel de Allende MX
Text: It is a Day of the Dead offering for my ancestors who suffered domestic violence. May her memory, joined with all the voices on this quilt, bring healing and change. The central image is a detail of my great-grandmother's tombstone. The fabrics have flower, fruit and chocolate prints.
BLANKET 3 TABLE 6
"In Life and Death United", Gina Hyams, United States / San Miguel de Allende MX
Text: It is a Day of the Dead offering for my ancestors who suffered domestic violence. May her memory, joined with all the voices on this quilt, bring healing and change. The central image is a detail of my great-grandmother's tombstone. The fabrics have flower, fruit and chocolate prints.
BLANKET 7 TABLE 3
Service name
Text: This blanket represents a significant aspect of the bond that is generated between women. Some photographs were used to make transfers of the representation of my grandmother and my mother, who for me are women who activate a bond. The aspects of the emotional bond occur in these two women who have resolved through their shortcomings, maintaining love and care in their lives and those around them. In this sense, this symbolic part of the women's heads in the center distributes a strength and the actions that are carried out give us many directions that can favor the union for an especially emotional benefit. Show that we are not alone, at any time. All that remains is to turn aside, to review our circle of emotional bond.
BLANKET 1 AND 2 PART 2
Girls from the Enedino Jiménez school in Juchitán, Oaxaca.
Technique: recycled and painted fabrics Oaxaca Mexico 2019
Text by: Diana Manzo. Part 2 / 3
How good it feels to know that, in this southern corner of Mexico, young women have another way of thinking, no longer like that of their mothers and grandmothers, perhaps who did not have the same opportunities in their time, but who now accompany them in the world of education and community life in collectivity.
The students between the ages of 12 and 14 made blankets with the acrylic painting technique for two weeks, instructed by the plastic artist Marcos Trujillo, and under the advice of the school psychologist Dora María Carrasco González and the teacher of the cutting and sewing workshop, Luz Arely Lopez Celaya.
"We painted the banners because we are in favor of women of all ages living free of violence, I liked to capture my legend in my language, Zapotec, because I know that this banner will be read by many women around the world."
BLANKET 5 TABLE 6
Name of LA MANTA
Text: I thought of a butterflies to represent my mom, my daughter, and myself. We all have our own struggles but I know we all have our own strengths. These are powerful and give me a sense of freedom and hope. Butterflies represent hope, that there's a possibility of tomorrow and it's another chance for change.
BLANKET 10 TABLE 6
El Enemigo, Dirse Tovar, photographic printing technique on canvas, Mexico 2019
Text: In the silence, submerged in the daily violence that blurs us, we are slowly erasing an I, ourselves. Silence eats our self-esteem with one big bite, snatches away our self-confidence leaving us in deep darkness. It is so fierce that it kills our own survival instinct. Silenced violence leads us to the dark forest of pain, a pain within a whirlwind that envelops us in an impenetrable and wrathful circle. It puts us in the center and it seems impossible to get out of it, but it is enough for our lips to name, say, denounce, avoid and reject so that little by little the whirlwind of silence loses strength and thus begin to walk without being violated, or without we violate ourselves. Talking, observing and questioning could break that external and internal violence that we apply to silence.
BLANKET 1 AND 2 PART 3
Girls from the Enedino Jiménez school in Juchitán, Oaxaca.
Technique: recycled and painted fabrics Oaxaca Mexico 2019
Text by: Diana Manzo. Part 2 / 3
Each of the blankets is impregnated with images and colors characteristic of the Zapotec culture, as well as shapes and cultural expressions.
"Many of our women knew what violence was, but with this activity they are convinced that they should not allow it in their lives, many knew that there was physical and psychological violence, now they have learned that there is also economic, sexual and even patrimonial violence" explained Dora María Carrasco González, a school psychologist.
May these blankets be an example for whoever looks at and admires them, that it be a space like her original idea, of healing, where she heals from the bottom of being without losing the essence of being a woman.
BLANKET 6 TABLE 5
Service name
Text: We are 4 women (Devika, 8 years old, her mother, her grandmother and her loving aunt) who live in Cancun. Devika has stated on several occasions that she is afraid, so we asked her how she would like to live. She told us that she wanted to go outside without an adult to go to the store and play in the park with her friends. She drew her wish and among all of us we captured it in this blanket, which we call “living without fear”.
BLANKET 16 TABLE 1 AND 2
Let the hand touch the heart, Cristina Cruz Herrán and Ma. Evangelina Herrán Paz, Technical Date: Blanket, thread, yarn and patchwork, Tijuana Mexico 2019
Text: Sewing is a piece of my family history, it is an act of spinning my own memory. My maternal grandmother was dedicated to sewing, she learned in Paraíso Novillero and at first she did not like it, she preferred to read, but in the town there were not many options. She made my mother's wedding dress and made clothes for my little brother and me.
My mother is now a scientist, but she inherited the knowledge of the needle and she taught it to me. It is an apprenticeship from now, three generations of women from my mother's side. It was a gift to be able to do this with my mother and remember the teachings of our ancestors in this hand-heart, during the process I liked taking care that my mother felt freely and creatively influence the piece.
BLANKET 17 TABLE 4
We Heal / Sanamos, Cindy Nelson/ Charlotte Friends Meeting, North Carolina EUA
Text: Our core beliefs align with your project and we have used them as inspiration for our pieces. Those are the testimonies of Community, Integrity, Peace, Equality and Stewardship._cc781905-5cde-3194- bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ We hope that through united voices we can voice our concern and help to heal... together.
BLANKET 24 TABLE 4
Women Dancing, Alicia Mosley, LA California 2019
Text: Some of us, by some chance, survived violence at the hands of men. Some of us don't. In both cases, the patriarchy tries to make us believe that it is our fault. We learn to carry the shame that does not belong to us. This piece tries to release that shame. It is about women coming together to support and encourage each other. It is about, despite the pain, finding joy. Alicia Mosley is a mother, poet, teacher, fiction writer, and survivor.
BLANKET 19 TABLE 1
Aquelarre, Ana Anaya, Ana Lilia Huitron, Cecilia Sahaerra and Alina Mandarina, Faculty of Arts and Design. Mexico UNAM 2019
Our blanket is made up of four female characters which were each embroidered with their own design and stitch style. These four women symbolize in some way the position that each one has on the main themes of the healing blanket: violence against the woman and mother earth.
We decided to create a setting that felt celebratory and calm as a sort of ideal that we were living at the time we talked about it, a setting where our characters felt connected and natural. Celebrating/being and being/feeling free witches, friends, sisters, companions and enjoying this nature that surrounds them without having to worry about being threatened because they are powerful, like us, how we all must become.
One of the most important parts of our blanket is the Qr code that is embroidered on the bottom of the blanket, which was thought of as a kind of seed inside the earth and that in real life has the function of being read. by a phone or device so that you can send them to a website still under development where we share information so that more women can resort to different reflections that we feel the need to share.
We were fortunate to be able to participate in the exhibition that took place on January 26 of this year, where we were able to help unite more blankets, as well as distribute the Qr code so that more people could access our page called You Are Not alone because it was designed to accompany/us, to reflect/us and to build a space where many women can come to feel safe and accompanied, our page also has information on security protocols and a small directory with safe contacts.
BLANKET 35 TABLE 1
El Enemigo, Dirse Tovar, photographic printing technique on canvas, Mexico 2019
Where are the missing? Various hands made this Michoacán patchwork; hands of mothers, wives, daughters and those who are in solidarity that make up the organization, Where are the Missing? AC. Bertha, Evangelina, Teresa, Janeth, are the women who are appreciated in the images holding with dignity, love and respect each of the missing family member. This piece represents the walk of thousands of families in Mexico that demand from each state: Truth, Justice and no repetition of information.
Morelia Michoacan, Mexico 2020 “Where are the missing”
BLANKET 23 TABLE 4
Carmen Flores Martinez, Sarah Rafael Garica, Santa Ana, CA, 2019
My patchwork is dedicated to my great aunt Carmen Flores Martínez who was brutally murdered by a man in Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico in the 1980s. Although no one in my family speaks of her death, and even this project caused conflict, I will never stop speaking or telling her story. Tia Carmen taught me at a young age that women didn't have to get married or have children. She was also an independent business owner who retrofitted her own home to create a little store that sold goods to the local community, enough to keep herself housed and fed without depending on anyone but herself.
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Map of Femicides, Laura Etel Briseño, Tijuana Mexico 2019
Text: Mexican Republic, United States with the highest number of femicides.
One way of teaching geography during primary education in Mexico, is through maps that are purchased in stores known as stationery. The format of these maps is iconic, because their design has not changed in a long time and over generations we have bought them to represent orography, hydrography, states, other countries, etc.
In my case, I wanted to represent this blanket of healing through this type of school maps, with the intention of ironizing what for years lives in our country and where there is no justice, that is, laws that Truly, programs for the protection of women that work and where there is no corruption and solutions that serve to safeguard our security and integrity are strictly complied with.
This banner is entitled Mexican Republic, States With the Highest Number of Femicides, and contains the four states with the highest number of femicides in 2019. By Laura Etel Briseño
BLANKET 27 TABLE 5
TEXTO X-RAY OF A COUNTRY.... Sad reflection of what we are experiencing today in our country... Impunity, abandonment, negligence and deceit, the result of an accelerated social decomposition that has come growing without limits, permeating the most sacred of a nation, as are its homes and inhabitants. Violence that unanimously reproduces and goes unnoticed and is being built with legitimacy..... The eradication of all kinds of violence will be the day we build relationships of respect and equality towards everything that represents diversity.
X-ray of a country, Irene Monarrez, Tijuana Mexico 2019
BLANKET 33 TABLE 9
Tierra, JoAnne Gatti-Petito, Adrienne, Alice, Anne Marie, Clara, Dee,
Jean, Joy, Maureen, Shelley and Sue. South Carolina, USA 2019.
BLANKET 35 TABLE 3
Que se arme la tejedera, Alicia Ortiz, Laura Ortiz, Melissa Lara, Bianca Islas, Ana Tello and Tzitziki Jaimes Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico 2020, “Interweaving Community” Interweaving Community
Text: The piece was created by the creativity and stitches of the collective that assemble the knitter. This collective is an effort to resist through embroidery, knitting, weaving and what is woven around the threads. The collective space emerged as a meeting space where different ideas converge and that through the threads we show our nonconformity.
Text: We are a group of seamstresses in the South Carolina Lowcountry who meet weekly to sew and talk about the mundane things in our lives. This project was a labor of love for us as we send positive energy to all women and children who have experienced violence. We are a diverse group in our melting pot community, coming from different areas of the country and with different points of view. What we can agree on is that no woman or child should experience violence in any society. We offer this sewn piece as a healing prayer to all those who suffer
BLANKET 37 TABLE 4
Ni Perdon Ni Olvido, Angela Coyota, technique: crocehet applications made with cotton yarn and acrylic paint, Mexico 2019
Text: the medicine of tissue that as creative expression is also a form of active meditation in internal connection, full attention , clarity in thought, a way to develop patience and express each feeling in a different way , Beyond the words.
BLANKET 41 TABLE 5
Thinking about the women of the past, Vicki Solot, Philadelphia, PA. USA
Text: While looking for materials for my patch, I came across a bag of old handkerchiefs on which I could embroider my message. I thought the scarves would be significant as they are leftovers from an era when women were valued even less than they are today, when children were not guaranteed an education and were not protected from exploitation, and when governments gave little thought to the effects of industrialism. it would have our health, the quality of air and water, and the future of the earth. While the materials may seem quaint, the message is urgent. It calls us to safeguard and protect our women and children and to save the earth before it is too late.
BLANKET 38 TABLE 5
Truncated joy, Claudia Martínez Patente R., Mexico 2020
Description: My canvas speaks of violent experiences that remain silent. Hence the background is the intimacy of a closet that I show split in two, joined by the seam of a wounded vagina. The clothes hung as a collage, is the story of the quinceañera who did not arrive at her party because they killed her or disappeared; the girlfriend who experiences violence and does not dare to speak; the young women who are abused, groped, raped; the woman who cannot express her sexuality out of fear and the most painful: that of childhood abuse.
BLANKET 43 TABLE 2
Women, Laura Larson, Los Angeles, CA USA
Text: This patchwork piece is a combination of fabric dye paintings I did in the early 1980's. They are airbrushed backgrounds on linen tea towels with painted figures on silk that are appliqued to the towels. I've used a cotton canvas backing as well.
BLANKET 40 TABLE 6
When I was young, Isabel Quintero, Los Angeles, Ca USA 2019
Text: My piece is about what women are taught. The talk we are given. The warnings about the violence that men are capable of. Growing up my mom always taught to be to lock doors, keep my legs shut, and speak kindly. But when I began going out by myself, as a young woman, she also gave me a knife to protect myself because ultimately no matter how much we watch our mouth or how tightly we keep our legs together, it is often never enough._cc781905- 5cde-3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_
BLANKET 45 TABLE 2
Trini, Adriana Dávila Ulloa, color thermal transfer, acrylic paint, thread, silkscreen printing
Text: This is Trini, my grandmother. A strong and brave woman who always fought for her children to stay together. She told me that she was in jail because she wanted to divorce my grandfather and he, because it was a sin, did not give it to her, so... they accused her of abandoning home and she was arrested. After many years he no longer spoke with rancor, what's more, he laughed, because of course, he couldn't believe it. In the end I like to believe that he managed to heal.
On the blanket, among the foliage of the tree, she travels with my grandmother Olga Pardo. They travel together, they left the same year, we miss them, we love them and I am sure that if they enjoyed anything in life, it was traveling. Have a good way my beautiful women.
BLANKET 51 TABLE 3
Hope, Rosario Glezmir, San Diego, CA USA
Text: My blanket is called hope, it depicts a woman with flowers and leaves on her head, as a symbol of life, the butterflies represent freedom (to live our life the way we want) and the word “Hope”, as reassurance that there is always hope if we work together for a better world and future.
BLANKET 59 TABLE 1
“Peribana” Ma. Guadalupe Moreno Cervantes
DESCRIPTION: The famous inlaid maque trays are a pre-Hispanic craft that could have originated in Peribán and for this reason they are known as Peribanas. Regularly it is a tray of Ayle, a wood endemic to the region, on which they work embedding colors in drawings, with paints and oils prepared with natural products. Franciscan chroniclers Alonso de la Rea and Pablo de Beaumont mention in their writings the existence of Peribanas since the time of Vasco de Quiroga, and during the Palm Sunday festivity. As a result of the eruption of the Paríkutin volcano in 1943, the Peribanas were no longer made, until July 4, 2011 when a group of people took up the project to recover this centenary and pre-Hispanic craft.
BLANKET 52
Mexico 2020
Text: The collective (Hacer Tequio) made La Manta de Curación/ The Patchwork Healing Blanket with their collaborators and compañeras who met to accompany each other on the path of healing from violent experiences that we have lived through. We also analyze the violence exerted against nature in our communities in Oaxaca, which offer us an extraordinary biocultural richness in traditions, culture, and natural resources. This is how we maintain support networks through community work and dialogue.
BLANKET 60
"I am the woman of my life" Jéssica Torres
TABLE 2.
I want to build my future without fear, I want to go out to my classes through dark streets without fear, and enjoy without fear of being drugged, shot, killed, I want everyone healthy, I want everyone healthy.
TABLE 4: Mónica Torres
We all have a light that characterizes us and that we have ancestors, which are an important part, since we are here because of them. I am a being who is carried away by intuition, positive and wanting to contribute to society, where I feel from the heart what I want and then I launch it to send it.
TODAY I CAN BE THE LIGHT OF SOMEONE ELSE, RADIATING THE BEST OF ME WITHOUT FEAR AND WITHOUT SELFISHNESS.
The Lily flower symbolizes the tree of life, perfection, light, resurrection and the grace of the god that illuminates.
The stars in the background refer to the fact that all women in the world have to make that shine grow by highlighting
their virtues and believe that we can do many things without fear of anything or anyone.
Blanket 58 TABLE 2
Whoever violates a woman, violates all, Lía Probst, Mexico 2019
Text: Today are times of protest; Today the voice of the Mexican woman rises in a cry that gains more strength each time it is ignored.
Monster: each blow that you give, each body that you outrage, each child that you snatch from its mother hardens the female heart that, torn apart, fights against your aggression; and also fight not to become a monster like you.
So listen to my peaceful protest today. You can stop today, you must stop today!
Today is a time of protest; Today the voice of the Mexican woman rises in a cry that grows stronger every time it is ignored. Monster: each blow you strike, each body you outrage, each child you snatch from his mother, hardens the feminine heart that fights against your aggression; and also fight not to become a monster like you. So listen to my peaceful protest today. You can stop today, you must stop today!
BLANKET 61
various artists
TABLE 2 “Enough”, Rosalva Cedeño
DESCRIPTION: It represents women without faces, but we know that they exist and that they have been kidnapped, beaten, raped and murdered. Each red dot represents the blood spilled by them.
TABLE 6 “Freedom”, Rosa Barajas / Andrea Moreno / Natasha Moreno
DESCRIPTION: Every year, the monarch butterfly migrates in winter from Canada to Mexico, flying against strong winds.
"Let's fly strong against the current, let's be the owners of our lives, let's inherit an example."
TABLE 7 “Heart without existence”, Andrea Arroyo
DESCRIPTION: In this blanket I captured and wanted to recognize all the women who are no longer with us for all the reasons that are included; recognizing that its heartbeat is still alive in us, for this reason I wanted to put the heart as the main image. we are not alone
BLANKET 62
various artists
TABLE 2
"His eyes were in the shadows", Martha Angélica Esquivel Méndez
DESCRIPTION:
In the shadow were his eyes
hidden with their shine
They have violated their being
And it feels not of this world
He knows his beauty and the beauty of the world
She wishes with all her strength that her
TABLE 4 “The Girl”, Denali Rojas Estrada.
DESCRIPTION: We are all. I am the Girl inside of you who couldn't grow up in time. The girl who was not allowed to grow according to her age. I am your. I am her. With so many unfulfilled dreams and with so many burdens to share. The girl inside you who didn't have time to grow up, didn't have permission to be.
BLANKET 66 TABLE 1
“Silence”, Sandra Reyes, January - Feb 2022, Erongarícuaro, Michoacán.
TECHNIQUE: (Photographic sublimation, textile applications and acrylic on canvas)DESCRIPTION: During a duel for gestational death, silence is also a form of violence.
BLANKET 63
various artists
TABLE 2 “His eyes were in the shadows”, Martha Angélica Esquivel Méndez
DESCRIPTION:
In the shadow were his eyes
hidden with their shine
They have violated their being
And it feels not of this world
He knows his beauty and the beauty of the world
She wishes with all her strength that her eyes shine back into the world
TABLE 4 “The Girl”, Denali Rojas Estrada
DESCRIPTION: We are all. I am the Girl inside of you who couldn't grow up in time. The girl who was not allowed to grow according to her age. I am your. I am her. With so many unfulfilled dreams and with so many burdens to share. The girl inside you who didn't have time to grow up, didn't have permission to be.
BLANKET 66 TABLE 3
“Autonomy”, Ana Beatriz Magallanes González / Laura Ballesteros
DESCRIPTION: The patriarchal medical model and the violence that women experience has modified the relationship with our bodies. Touching without consent, with violent obstetric interventions, with unnecessary caesarean sections, is how many of us bring our children into the world. And after giving birth, the forced sterilizations, the planning methods imposed by those who believe they know more about our bodies than we ourselves, become the reality of many. The appropriation of our body begins with free choice, with our commitment to take care of it, with the full awareness of knowing (and believing) that no one knows their body better than oneself. And from there we grow, from there we flourish. Autonomy begins with the body!
BLANKET 65
various artists
TABLE 3: “Resilience”, Ma. Trinidad Santoyo Guillén
DESCRIPTION: Life is unpredictable, sometimes complicated, but even so, we will always find someone, something or some ways to move forward along the way. Go around you, observe and you will see that there is always something that will help you see her with more love and want her to continue living as she is.
TABLE 5: “Crysalis”, Ana Rosa Méndez
DESCRIPTION: And suddenly everything called my attention; My whole being, my environment, screamed for a change, my internal wisdom, my emotions and my thoughts joined with my physical body; The doors of perception were opened, amplifying my consciousness, desperately demanding that the change take place in order to finally be congruent with my whole being that vibrates in love.
BLANKET 66 TABLE 4 and 5
FRAME 4: “Here I am!” and TABLE 5: “Serenity”
TABLE 4: “Here I am!”, Bertha Alicia Arroyo Sánchez
DESCRIPTION: For the time I didn't see you, SORRY.
TABLE 5: “Serenity”, Hilda Chávez Esquivel
DESCRIPTION: A brief, but sometimes much-needed reminder of the value that each one of us has. May you always find your light no matter how adverse fate may seem.