Juneteenth Summit 2022: The Black Family- Equipping the Black Family For Changes in Stages

Libation & Liberation Libation & Liberation is a community based quilt project developed and led by The Juneteenth NYC team. We invite descendants of enslaved Africans to channel the rich cultural legacy of Black American textile-making to honor loved ones lost to COVID-19. As Juneteenth gains national visibility, especially with its federal approval in 2021, the project aims to cement the holiday as an opportunity for creative expressions of grief and mourning as well as community co-creation and storytelling. Participants of all ages are encouraged to design a block in memory of a family member or friend recently lost to the virus. Each stitch will serve as a Libation and a guide towards a future where victims of COVID-19 are tightly bound to our collective freedom. A limited number of workshops will be offered for individuals looking to create in a communal setting. For those who prefer to make at home, materials can be picked up at partner sites. Libation & Liberation draws inspiration from Ashley’s Sack. Discovered in 2007, Ashley’s Sack is a cotton bag featuring embroidered text in copper, lime, and rose-colored threads. It tells the story of three generations of Black women at once: Rose, an enslaved woman, mother of Ashley; Ashley, daughter of Rose, sold at the age of nine in South Carolina; and Ruth Middleton, granddaughter of Ashley who took up the needle and thread to stitch her family’s history in place. Much like Ashley’s Sack, the core of this project honors rituals for healing and the memorial process. What is revealed when soft, malleable fabric meets the hard, steady puncture of the needle? Here, sewing weaves, opens, comforts, and hides inequities of the health-care system, histories of racism, strategies for survival, and the impact of these issues on our contemporary reality.