TONIGHT: 1st Congreg. Church hosts show & sale of PeaceQuilts, original works by Haitian artists

October 15, 2010
by Maud Bailey

Tonight, Friday, October 15, The First Congregational Church of Chappaqua, will host a Quilt Show and Sale presented by PeaceQuilts from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.  The story behind the PeaceQuilts Project is an intriguing one, and Jeanne Staples, director of PeaceQuilts, will be on hand to explain its mission to help Haitian women earn a living wage.

The highlight of the show will, of course, be the quilts, which vary in size and style and are priced to sell at $50.00 to $400.00.  Admission is free and light refreshments will be served. (If you are so inclined, the church suggests a $5.00 contribution per person to cover the cost of food.) Make it your Friday night entertainment, and feel good about indulging yourself.

The origins of the PeaceQuilts Project

The PeaceQuilts Project, a non-profit, humanitarian organization founded on Martha’s Vineyard, is helping to relieve poverty in Haiti by establishing and supporting women’s quilting cooperatives through which Haitian women can earn a living wage from their creative work.  The women design and create one-of-a-kind quilts using Haitian imagery. They earn a daily wage plus a handsome commission when the quilts are sold. The goal is to make each cooperative fully independent, owned and operated by its members.

The story of PeaceQuilts is a novel and highly unlikely one. In this tropical country, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, the concept of quilts and quilting was introduced into a Haitian training school curriculum by Jeanne Staples, a visionary artist from Martha’s Vineyard, and Maureen Matthews McClintock, a master quilter and clinical psychotherapist from rural Vermont. These two women then nurtured this project into an entrepreneurial success in less than three years. 

Just as improbable, a well-respected New England museum mounted an exhibition of the quilts last fall, attracting large and enthusiastic crowds.  The exhibition, “Patience to Raise the Sun,” organized by the Bennington Museum in Bennington, Vermont, is now being developed into a national touring show. The show features twenty-two original art quilts, as well as photo enlargements of the quilters and their environs, and objects cleverly used in the creation of the quilts.

For example, the show includes a charcoal iron and brazier, which the women use when there is no electricity available. The brazier is like a hibachi grill with a grate. The coal pieces are placed on the grate over a fire and when they get hot, they are removed and placed in the iron as its heat source. The iron is then used on the quilting pieces.
A beautiful sixty-page catalog was published by PeaceQuilts to accompany the exhibition. The next stop for the show is at the African American Museum on Philadelphia on January 26, 2010.

Bringing meaningful and productive work to Haiti
 
In Haiti today, work is scarce and one job-holding Haitian often supports three generations of family.  The women of the PeaceQuilts cooperative are not only earning a living wage, but are setting up additional PeaceQuilts workshops at schools and other locations, including the newest one in Cité Soleil, Port-au-Prince’s most notorious slum.

Here in the United States, volunteers have contributed their time and talents to the project, and quilters across the country have donated materials and supplies.  For more information on PeaceQuilts, go to www.haitipeacequilts.org.

If you have any questions about the October 15 PeaceQuilts event, please contact Maud Bailey at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or 914-238-7577. The First Congregational Church is located at 210 Orchard Ridge Road in Chappaqua.