The Grandmothers’ Blanket

Included in GATHER at The Rooms in 2024, The Grandmothers’ Blanket emerged from two years of the artist’s hand stitching in conversation with a collection of mostly family linens that had been handworked by other women. Partly in service to and partly in celebration of the quiet and often marginalized work of women, this piece and process became a long and continuous “sewing lesson” for the artist… a performance of the labour it was hoping to make discernible to others. It was a material and contemplative dialogue with precious old things, which like their makers, are often erased, cast off, and discarded. It was a way to reveal, to honour and to put-to-work the quiet but powerful labour of the female hand. A way to “use up” what the artist had gathered and deploy it against forgetfulness.

The artist is grateful to the Canada Council of the Arts for support that enabled the completion of this work. The Grandmothers’ Blanket has been acquired by The Rooms for their Permanent Collection.