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Showing posts with label Diversity Banner Inspiration and History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Diversity Banner Inspiration and History. Show all posts
Sunday, 24 March 2024
Tuesday, 15 June 2021
National Association of Colored Women's Club
Silk, wood, paint.
A purple silk banner with gold fringe and the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs' motto, "LIFTING / AS / WE CLIMB" painted in large gold letters. The banner was used by the Oklahoma Federation of Colored Women's Clubs. T Above the words is a painted design of three interlocking triangles, the center of which is filled with the two on either side in outline. The bottom of the banner is scalloped and has an attached length of fringe. The top of the banner has a sewn loop running its length for a rod (2010.2.1b) to be inserted. There is a strip of gold fringe sewn just below this loop. The rod is currently stored in place in the banner. It is painted gold at the ends and has a dowel inserted at the end of the proper left side with a hole for a dowel on the proper right side.
Our History
We are women of color, African American women, black women.
Long before the founding of the of the organization, our forbearers, had organized ourselves into self-improvement and charitable organizations. These organizations were led by women named Harriet Tubman and Helen Appo Cook (both NACW founders), Sojourner Truth, Anna Julia Cooper, Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin and a plethora of unnamed others whose lives were devoted to the struggle to free people of color from the bondage of slavery, illiteracy, and prejudice in an unforgiving world that treated them as less than human. It was also the time of Ida B. Wells Barnett and her Red Record, a voluminous documentation of the lynching of black Americans.
The Letter
In 1895 James W. Jacks, president of the Missouri Press Association, received a letter from Florence Balgarnie of the English Anti-Lynching League asking American journalists to help battle lynching. Jacks’ now infamous reply to her letter, attacked African Americans and specifically, black women. Jacks wrote that, “The Negroes in this country are wholly devoid of morality. They know nothing of it except as they learn by being caught for flagrant violations of law and punished therefor… They consider it no disgrace but rather an honor to be sent to prison and to wear striped clothes. The women are prostitutes and all are natural liars and thieves….Out of 200 in this vicinity it is doubtful if there are a dozen virtuous women of that number who are not daily thieving from the white people.”
The Founding of NACWC
Equivalent to the “shot heard round the world” triggering the American Revolution, the effect of James Jacks’ letter response to Florence Balgarnie’s solicitation of journalist support against lynching, catapulted black women into action.
A national “Call to Confer” sent to women’s organizations of color was issued by Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin, leader of Boston’s New Era Club.
At the conference, held in 1896 in Washington, DC, Mrs. Ruffin is quoted as stating, “The reasons why we should confer are so apparent…We need to talk over not only those things which are of vital importance to us as women, but also the things that are of special interest to us as colored women, the training of our children, openings for our boys and girls, how they can be prepared for occupations and occupations may be found or opened to them, what we especially can do in the moral education of the race with which we are identified, our mental elevations and physical development, the home training it is necessary to prepare them to meet [the] peculiar [special; difficult] conditions in which they find themselves, how to make the most of our own…opportunities, these are some of our questions to be discussed.”
Mrs. Ruffin’s statement is the foundation of the NACWC Mission. The enduring spirit of the statement has emboldened and inspired clubwomen, who have for nearly 120 years, given their energy, time, talent and their finances to serving their communities.
Above text and image from website:
One of the most significant women’s clubs of all time was formed by black women for the advancement and empowerment of black communities. It is also the first and oldest national Black Organization, and it is known as the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs.
For Black Americans, the post-abolition era was characterized by a shadow of violence, hardship, and oppression. Plagued by social issues like poverty, illiteracy, and poor working conditions, black communities recognized a resounding need for justice and reform. The rise of Jim Crow Laws gave way to heightened racism, then to widespread violence as lynchings threatened the safety and sovereignty of African Americans.
Especially in the South, white communities ignored the dire call to end racism and racial violence. In 1896, that call became even more urgent when a journalist named James Jacks delivered a horrifying response to a letter asking him to publicly condemn lynching. Jacks specifically attacked black women in his publication, describing them as “prostitutes” and “thieves” who were “devoid of morality”. His words demonstrated that much of the country was too enmeshed in it’s archaic, dangerous views of race to come to the aid of its black citizens.
Black women quickly realized that their greatest strength was in their identity. Their greatest weapon against racism was their own deep understanding of the plight of being black, woman, and oppressed in post-abolition America. In this time of radically heightened hostility, it was clear that black women themselves would have to begin the work toward racial equity- and they would have to do so by elevating themselves first. This realization prompted the coalescence of the National Association of Colored Women (later known as the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs).
The founding members of NACW rejected Jacks’ venomous narrative because they valued the strength and virtue of the black woman and knew that she was the key to moving Black Americans forward in society. The National Association of Colored Women was born out of this knowledge. Mary Mcleod Bethune officially organized the NACW in 1896. She would later become the first black female to head a federal office. Mary Church Terrell, a lifelong advocate for desegregation and women’s suffrage, acted as the Association’s first President. Another founding member was Josephine St Pierre Ruffin, who also created the very first black women’s newspaper. Other iconic members of the NACW are Fanny Coppin, Harriet Tubman, and Ida B. Wells.
The NACW’s founding principle was “Lifting as we Climb”, which echoed the nature of its work. Core members of the Association were educators, entrepreneurs, and social activists. They believed that by elevating their status as community organizers and leaders, black women could elevate the status of their entire communities. The Association focused on improving the public image of black women and bolstering racial pride. An empowering social space, the NACW encouraged black women to take on leadership roles and spearhead reform within their communities.
In the coming decades, the NACW focused much of its efforts on providing resources and social services to some of the most powerless members of society. Social welfare projects centered on a variety of youth issues.The Association built schools to offer better educational opportunities to children and to protect them from entering the juvenile justice system. The women of NACW also aided the elderly by funding and establishing assisted living homes. The Association was committed to promoting good moral standing and erasing harmful, racist stigmas about their community. Thus, they encouraged all members of the community to embody acceptable standards of hard work and virtuous behavior. The NACW provided access to many other resources, including daycares, health clinics, job trainings, and parenting classes.
The NACW also hoped to provide better opportunities for black women to advance as professionals and leaders. They established programs to assist women migrating from the South, offering affordable housing and job opportunities. Politically, the NACW took a strong stance against racist legislation. Mary B. Talbert, a founding member, was one of the most influential voices in the fight for passage of a federal anti-lynching bill. During this fight, the NACW fundraised, organized, and ultimately helped to further the agenda of anti-lynching activists. The Association also participated in the pursuit for women’s suffrage. With the NACWC behind them, black women influenced legislation, education, youth issues, economic empowerment, literacy, and activism as they worked tirelessly to meet the needs of Black America. In the past century, the NACW has secured tremendous progress and justice for African American communities. Today, the organization continues its devotion to the betterment of those communities. Now known as the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs, the Association includes chapters all over the country and is primarily active in fundraising, education, and health and social services.
When great women convene for a cause, it is often found that the strength of their numbers transcends the power of solidarity. Women who share a common goal quickly realize the political, economic, and social power that is possible with their shared skills and talents- the power to transform their world. The National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs is an inspiring testament to the power of united women.
Above image and text source Women's Museum
Gilbert Baker, Artist
Note:
While we are not designing flags, the history of the Pride Flag is significant
and the design has been adopted to the banner format.
Above image from Gilbert Baker Foundation
Revel in the First Pride Flag, Long-assumed Lost, in San Francisco
The first Rainbow Flag, designed by artist and activist Gilbert Baker, was raised in 1978.
The first Rainbow Flag, adopted by the LGBTQ community as a symbol of pride and solidarity, was raised on June 25, 1978, at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade. It was created by Gilbert Baker, an artist and queer activist, who described his rainbow-striped design as “something beautiful, something from us … it really fits our diversity in terms of race, gender, ages, all of those things.” That day, two pride banners replaced the United States and United Nations flags hoisted at the United Nations Plaza.
The flags constitute a priceless piece of queer history, but until now, they were both presumed lost. This April, a 10-by-28 feet-long segment of one of Baker’s authentic pride flags entered the collection of the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco, where it was unveiled last week as part of the ongoing exhibition Performance, Protest and Politics: The Art of Gilbert Baker.
The segment of one of the original rainbow flags created for San Francisco Gay Freedom Day 1978 rests in its case at the GLBT Historical Society Museum. (photograph by Andrew Shaffer, courtesy GLBT Historical Society)
The two flags flown during the 1978 parade were badly mildewed and damaged during storage at the San Francisco Gay Community Center in the years that followed, but Baker secretly managed to salvage a scrap of one of them. When the artist died in 2017, the historic piece of fabric landed in the hands of his sister Ardonna Cook, who loaned it to the Gilbert Baker Foundation two years later for the June 2019 Stonewall 50 Pride Parade in New York City. At that time, the Foundation was in the dark about the banner’s fascinating origins.
After the 2019 event, the fragment of the flag was folded and kept in the Manhattan home of Charley Beal, the foundation’s director. That summer, Beal was coincidentally contacted by James Ferrigan, an expert vexillologist — or flag historian — and one of Beal’s collaborators in the 1970s who was on the hunt for the long-lost segment. Upon hearing Ferrigan’s description of the fabric scrap, Beal realized it was the very same banner that was sitting in storage in his home.
Following authentication, the iconic relic was donated to the GLBT Historical Society, a public museum and archive focused on promoting a deeper understanding of LGBTQ history, culture, and arts.
“People are moved to tears because of how important and significant that first flag-flying in 1978 was to them,” the museum’s executive director, Terry Beswick, told the Guardian.
Unlike the mostly six-color Rainbow Flags seen today, Baker’s original design featured eight stripes with a pink strip at the top — a nod to the inverted pink triangle, a badge enforced by Nazi Germany during its persecution of gay men that has been reclaimed by the LGBTQ community. The last few years have seen a wave of new LGBTQ banners: in 2017, the city of Philadelphia introduced its own “Philly Pride Flag,” which incorporates black and brown stripes to represent the Black and Latin communities. Others flaunt the baby pink and blue colors of the Trans Pridge Flag, which subverts the traditional hues associated with gender as assigned at birth.
Beswick notes that Baker deliberately chose not to trademark his creation and “died a pauper, despite the fact that millions and millions of dollars have been made using the rainbow as an LGBTQ+ symbol.”
“Gilbert not only created a symbol of our movement, but that creation has actually pushed our movement forward,” Beswick said.
Article above from HyperAllergic
Sunday, 7 February 2021
Doris Salcedo (b. 1958, Columbia)
A site specific public art project recognizing those
who died in Colombia's Civil War.
Bogota, 2016
“Doris wants to do something for peace, but we still don’t know what it is,” students reportedly whispered. Soon after, a mass email was sent to the entire campus: “Doris Salcedo invites us to draw the names of victims of the decades-long conflict on seven kilometers of cloth and then put them together with needle and thread.” In response, thousands of volunteers from around the city gathered early on the morning of October 6. Among them was Mariana Sanz de Santamaria, a law student: “Once you arrived, you saw many tables filled with volunteers. There were some people cutting up the letters and others who were getting the cloth ready to be printed with the names of victims of the conflict, which had been gathered from the government’s Registry of Victims.” The pieces of cloth would later be sewn together across Bolívar Square.
The work, called Sumando Ausencias (Adding Absences) is a statement of mourning, but also a call for peace, Sáez said. Salcedo has said the result of the quilt will be a “flag-shroud” that evokes both those sentiments.
“The act of sewing together each piece of cloth in an act of reparation, of knitting our own peace and is especially important at this time of uncertainty,” she said.
More to read and see.
The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/12/colombia-war-art-project-bogota-doris-salcedo
Smithsonian Magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/artist-blanketed-bogotas-bolivar-square-names-victims-colombias-civil-war-180960798/
AIDS Memorial Quilt
The Ashes on the Lawn
Stories about the protests and mourning
associated with the AIDS pandemic.
Listen to the podcast at Radio Lab:
The time specific to the quilts is 15:00.
Link below to learn more about the quilt:
Above image source:
Above image source:
Above image source:
Wednesday, 27 January 2021
Women's Suffrage
Silk, 1914 - 1917
65 in x 67 in
Suffragists from the National Woman’s Party made smaller versions of the banner used on the 1913 parade’s first float. These "Great Demand" banners were used in demonstrations and rallies and at suffrage headquarters. Marie Gilmer Louthan carried this one in suffrage parades. Source https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_1371103
Three National Woman's Party members with "Wage Earners" banner during the dedication ceremonies for the Alva E. Belmont House, 1922. Photo: Library of Congress.
Article:
Women picket the White House in 1917, demanding full access to voting rights.
Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs DivisionSource: https://www.nps.gov/articles/womens-suffrage-wwi.htm
The Belmont-Paul House, as it is more simply known, has stood on Capitol Hill for almost 220 years. It is a stone’s throw away from the Capitol itself. In 1929 the National Woman’s Party (NWP), an organization integral to the passage and ratification of the 19th amendment, bought the gracious brick house on Maryland Avenue and Second Street NE to use as headquarters. Today it is home to the NWP’s collections and its exhibit detailing the fight for women’s suffrage.
One circa June 1917 banner framed in the hallway declares “THE YOUNG ARE AT THE GATES.” This draws on a longer passage by NWP member Lavinia Dock with which reform-minded youths today may well identify.
“What is the potent spirit of youth? Is it not the spirit of revolt, of rebellion against senseless and useless and deadening things? Most of all, against injustice, which is of all stupid things the stupidest? …The old stiff minds must give way. The old selfish minds must go. Obstructive reactionaries must move on. The young are at the gates!”
More to read and see on website.
Link below:
Friday, 15 January 2021
Silence=Death
Note:
The image below is of a a lithograph. The use of color, shape, composition and text be adapted to textiles.
Read on for images and info on the significance of the pink triangle.
1987
33 9/16 × 21 15/16 in.
In 1987, Avram Finkelstein, Brian Howard, Oliver Johnston, Charles Kreloff, Chris Lione, and Jorge Socarrás founded the SILENCE=DEATH Project to support one another in the midst of the AIDS crisis.
Inspired by the posters of the Art Workers Coalition and the Guerrilla Girls (both of whose work is on view nearby), they mobilized to spread the word about the epidemic and created the now-iconic Silence=Death poster featuring the pink triangle as a reference to Nazi persecution of LGBTQ people in the 1930s and 1940s. It became the central visual symbol of AIDS activism after it was adopted by the direct action advocacy group AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP).
HIV and AIDS remain a global health issue, with nearly 40 million people living with HIV at the end of 2017. Communities of color continue to face disproportionate effects of the disease as well as barriers to treatment. Today, ACT UP remains dedicated to their original 1987 slogan: ACT UP! FIGHT BACK! FIGHT AIDS!
The trailblazing activist and artist Keith Haring wearing a t-shirt printed with the above image.
Above graphic was originally produced by the curatorial team; they contain images and research (with permissions granted) from USHMM, Yad Veshem, Jewish Virtual Library, The Simon Wiesenthal Center, the Anti-Defamation League, and the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust (1990; I. Gutman, ed.). Information and data in the infographics were fact-checked by Dr. Geoffrey Megargee of the USHMM. For more information, contact Dr. Cary Lane.
The Jacket from Dachau: One Survivor’s Search for Justice, Identity, and Home
Survivors of the Holocaust frequently attribute their ability to avoid death to one main variable: luck. For Benzion Peresecki, the 15 year-old son of a delicatessen owner from Radviliškis, Lithuania, surviving the Holocaust was indeed fortunate, but came at an immense cost.
Within a span of 10 years, Benzion’s father died from a stomach ulcer, his brother was murdered by the Nazis, he was forced into a ghetto, and was imprisoned, beaten, and subjected to forced labor at the Dachau concentration camp. After liberation, Benzion spent five years in a displaced persons camp with his mother, Chiena, who herself survived a death march at the Stutthof concentration camp.
After immigrating to the United States, Benzion fought to re-establish his identity, find justice for his family’s suffering, and create a new home. Throughout his postwar years, no matter where he lived and how many times he moved, he always kept his jacket from Dachau.
Benzion never explained to his family or friends why he brought the jacket with him to New York; in fact, he never told his children that it even existed. However, keeping his jacket is consistent with other resilient actions on his part: his immigration to the United States; his search for a new, meaningful identity despite underemployment and several iterations of his name (he formally changed his name to “Ben Peres” soon after his immigration); his courage coping with the emotional and psychological stress from his traumas; his tenacious search for justice through a decades-long reparations campaign with the German government; and, his determination to support his wife, mother, and two children in New York.
On July 4, 2015, Ben’s jacket, which had been in his closet for 65 years (and 37 years after his death), was discovered at the estate sale of his home in Bellmore, Long Island by a vintage clothing collector named Jillian Eisman. Ms. Eisman’s grandfather served in the Soviet army during World War II, and her brother was killed on 9/11; so, she immediately recognized the jacket as an object of pain, understanding, comfort, and reflection with which the public should engage. She subsequently donated the jacket to the Kupferberg Holocaust Center to ensure that students and the broader community could view the jacket and understand its significance.
New York, a city of immigration, determination, tragedy, and perseverance, also plays a role in this story. Ben and his mother lived and worked in Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Manhattan after their immigration. They also both received medical treatment from several New York doctors for physical and psychological injuries sustained during the Holocaust. In 1968, with modest reparations payments awarded by the German government more than 20 years after their liberation, Ben and his mother, Chiena, along with his wife, Chaya, and two children, Lorrie and Michael, were finally able to buy a permanent home in Bellmore, NY. Ben lived there until his death in 1978.
This exhibit was compiled from over 1500 documents, films, and photographs left by Ben Peres and his family that contextualize his search for justice, identity, and home after he was torn away from his Lithuanian home. The curatorial team for the exhibit included Queensborough’s own students and KHRCA interns: Peter Bandziukas, Kaitlyn Cicciariello, Gillian Farnan, Abigail Jalle, Alejandro Leal-Pulido, Daniel Nussdorf, and Nitya Ramanathan.
We encourage you to visit the reflection area in the gallery and in the online version of the exhibit, both of which are structured to document your own responses to this compelling story.
―Cary Lane, Ph.D., Curator-in-Residence, KHRCA, Assistant Professor of English
―Dan Leshem, Ph.D., Director, KHRCA
We would like to acknowledge and thank Marisa Hollywood, Assistant Director of the KHRCA, Yad Vashem, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Dr. Geoffrey Megargee, Dr. Saulius Sužiedėlis, Jillian Eisman, Sam Widowsky, the USC Shoah Foundation, Kat Griefen, Lorrie Peres, and Michael Peres for testimonies, historical information, fact-checking, documents, images, and films that helped contextualize the artifacts in this exhibit. We also wish to thank Henry Schein, Inc. and Henry Schein Cares for their invaluable mentorship and support.
Source:
Queensborough Community College
Beginning in 1937–1938, the SS created a system of marking prisoners in concentration camps. Sewn onto uniforms, the color-coded badges identified the reason for an individual’s incarceration, with some variation among camps. The Nazis used this chart illustrating prisoner markings in the Dachau concentration camp.
Source, United States Holocaust Museum: https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/artifact/chart-of-prisoner-markings
A striped overcoat of the Buchenwald camp.
Jim Crow Laws and Apratheid
JIM CROW LAWS
Source: https://naacpnewbedford.org/2021/04/lynched-yesterday/
Artist Dread Scott
New York, 2016
In 2015, Walter Scott fled for his life, stalked by a policeman who then cold bloodedly shot him in the back. We all saw the video and in response to this murder I made the artwork, “A Man Was Lynched by Police Yesterday.” This simple banner, printed with the eponymous words, is an update of an iconic flag that the NAACP flew from their national headquarters window in New York in the nineteen-twenties and thirties the day after someone was lynched. It read simply: “A Man Was Lynched Yesterday” and was part of a their anti-lynching campaign — a national effort to end that scourge.
During the Jim Crow era, Black people were terrorized by lynching — often public and publicized extra legal torture and murder of Black people. It was a threat that hung over all Black people who knew that for any reason or no reason whatsoever we could be killed and the killers would never be brought to justice. Now the police are playing the same role of terro
r that lynch mobs did at the turn of the century. It is a threat that hangs over all Black people, that we can be killed by the police for no reason whatsoever; for a traffic stop, for selling CDs, for selling cigarettes. Shot to death, choked to death, tasered to death. Standing still, fleeing. Shot in the chest, shot in the back. Hands up, hands down. Point blank range or at a distance. And the police never face justice for their crimes. Like lynchers in the Jim Crow era, there can be eye witnesses, and now even video evidence, and yet the police get away with murder.
My art often looks at how the past sets the stage for the present but also exists in the present in new form. This artwork is an unfortunately necessary update to address a horror from the past that is haunting us in the present.
Responding to the recent police killings of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling, this updated flag was a last minute addition to For Freedoms at Jack Shainman Gallery in New York (July 2016). It was an unusual, bold, courageous and fitting decision for the gallery to decide to include “A Man Was Lynched…” The art was displayed on the outside of the gallery in a highly visible manner in a way that was evocative of the NAACP presentation. Immediately people responded and initiated a much needed wider conversation, leading to coverage in the New York Times, PBS Newshour Magazine, Fox News, Hyperallergic, Artnet.com and on social media.
There is an epidemic of police killing people. 1,134 stolen lives in 2015 alone. Around the country, people are deeply concerned and taking action—from determined protest shutting down streets to respected athletes, musicians and artists are making powerful statements and art. This is inspiring and needs to grow. I’m glad for A Man Was Lynched by Police Yesterday to be part of the growing dissent and ferment as people act to end police terror.
Source is artist website: https://www.dreadscott.net/portfolio_page/a-man-was-lynched-by-police-yesterday/
BOYCOTTING APARTHEID
The Anti-Apartheid Movement’s local groups gave it a presence all over Britain. Some groups had hundreds of members and links to trade unions, churches and community organisations. Others were kept going by a few dedicated activists.
Anti-apartheid groups campaigned to end British links with South Africa within their local communities. They asked shoppers to boycott South African goods and pressed local branches of supermarket chains like Tesco and Sainsbury’s to stop selling them. They handed out leaflets outside Barclays Bank and Shell petrol stations explaining how the companies supported apartheid. Source link: https://www.aamarchives.org/who-was-involved/local-aa-groups.html
The People’s History Museum in Manchester, England, is the UK’s national centre for the collection, interpretation and study of material relating to the history of working people in the UK and it has a fabulous collection of protest banners from the last 150 years. For any Union members considering how to activate support for radical action in fashion, banner making might be the perfect place to start… It is also an activity that can potentially be combined with a Local Assembly and with the upswing in marches and school strikes, there may be plenty of opportunities to take it onto the streets or certainly adorn our studios, offices and classrooms.
The protest banners at the People’s History Museum combine fabric, stitch, paint, iron-on interfacing, fringe (lots of fringe). The base cloth varies from silk to polyester and cotton. Some are huge, some small.
Below is one image from the website. Website also has banners representing organizations. Go to link to see more. https://concernedresearchers.org/protest-banners-at-the-peoples-history-museum/
Colchester apartheid group, 1960.
Black cotton, lettering and design in iron-on polyester interfacing
Black cotton, lettering and design in iron-on polyester interfacing
Hackney and Tower Hamlets AA Group protesting outside an exhibition sponsored by Barclays Bank in Tower Hamlets Town Hall, east London in 1985. Barclays was the biggest high street bank in South Africa. Copyright © Petite Barbara
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