“I have so looked forward to these classes”
14 July 2009 By Nora West, project co-ordinator Mary (not her real name) is the oldest of the eight women who elected to join the WAY OUT – STAY OUT six-week pilot fabric art course, held recently at the Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility in Manukau. The course involved using various sewing and knitting skills, and documenting these in a journal.
Mary was by far the most enthusiastic and articulate journal writer. The other women called her “Grandma”, which is also what she calls herself. She always called me “Miss Nora”.
Mary’s first project was a patchwork cushion, with the flower pattern picked out in back stitch and Grandma May 2009 inscribed on it. This took her three weeks and she wrote: “I am never bored and am surprised to find I enjoy this painstaking work.” However, she noted that other women in the group grabbed the best threads so that “What is supposed to be a pleasant experience for me is tarnished”.
Then Mary tried petit point canvas work, inventing the design and applying it to a fabric bag. These were skills that she had not tried before, and she gave the bag to her sister. I photographed this for a report on the class, and it gave her huge pleasure to hear that it was put up on the Arts Access Aotearoa website.
“Famous in prison!!” she wrote.
Lost in the snow
When I gave each of the participants an art postcard for Easter, Mary chose a Victorian snow scene, with a destitute women lost in the snow. “The woman is like me before I began to realise I am worthy,” she wrote in her journal.
Next week was Mother's Day and the class pulled out all the stops to celebrate. They presented me with a hand-made and inscribed bag from scraps of fabric, as well as a white rose made from toilet paper. I brought in lots more fabric, and Mary pounced on a pink silk scarf and draped it around her neck. The others admired her wearing it. “I adore it,” she wrote. “it's been a long time since I felt even slightly elegant.”
By now, the women were so keen that they were already at work by the time I arrived each Sunday.
There were at least four quilts in progress, with patchwork cushions and knitted items. I photographed all these items and gave print-outs to the women to use in their journals.
"I feel special"
A classmate gave Mary a tapestry lighter holder with her name on it. “It is unique and I feel special. Now everyone wants one,” she wrote alongside the pasted-in image in her journal. “This is our penultimate class with Miss Nora. I have so looked forward to these classes.”
I had asked them to make a friendship quilt to commemorate the WAY OUT class. It had nine panels. Mary made two of the panels and edged the border. When I returned after the course had finished, I hung it up on the wall so we could all admire it. It was the first time they had perceived the quilt, or any fabric art, as a picture.
“We never thought all those squares would look good next to each other but it looks fine,” they said.
Mary's last journal image was of art viewers in the Auckland Art Gallery. Alongside the image she had written: “NEXT STEP? The possibilities are limitless!”
I would never have guessed the depth of Mary's responses unless she had written them in her journal. She used a much wider vocabulary there than in her conversation and displayed real self-perception.
Her comments demonstrate the gains in self-image produced by learning and sharing traditional fabric skills. All the women were already proficient needle workers and eager to teach each other new techniques. They needed only a supply of scraps, with some praise and encouragement.
Documenting and publishing the items they had made proved to be invaluable in raising perceptions of the value of fabric works. Postcards and books on art were highly valued, while getting them to write down the experience in a journal captured the journey and made sense of it.