The Original Proposal

“During the 2006 conflict in Lebanon, I and my friends reacted to the destruction and loss of life with sorrow, frustration, anger, and despair. There didn’t seem to be anything we could do—there barely seemed to be any way to even talk about the conflict. Keeping silent made us feel even more powerless. I looked for a way to bring people together to talk openly about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and was inspired by the recent Faith Quilts Project and its ability to form communities around collaborative quilting. The Dialogue Forum and the Public Conversations Project supported the idea, and the result was the Middle East Dialogue Quilt.”

--Lead Quilter Emily Ronald

Mission:

To use the art form of collaborative quilting to design and build a quilt around the issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Initial design of the quilt will involve a dialogue between members of many communities, and construction will be shared among all these groups. This use of hands-on work will inspire conversation on many levels, providing a means of discussing the conflict while focusing on a group project. The quilt, which will be donated to the Friends Meeting House in Ramallah, is intended to be both a visual expression of hope and a message from people of many diverse communities.

The development of the quilt is a three-part process of design, basic construction, and group collaboration.

The design stage happens in a dialogue meeting, which will involve both an introduction to the idea of collaborative quilting and a discussion of important matters in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Participants are invited to come from a variety of religious, social, and activist communities. Over the course of the dialogue, participants will suggest design elements for the quilt, and will brainstorm more communities that would be interested in participating in the quilt’s construction.

Basic construction of the quilt is the responsibility of the Lead Quilter, who will integrate the suggested design elements into a single design which allows for community participation in its final construction, and prepare the quilt itself for community stitching.

During the group collaboration, the Lead Quilter will bring the quilt to interested communities. In this series of meetings, participants will have the opportunity to cut, glue, stitch, and otherwise complete the design of the quilt. At this stage, anyone can participate regardless of sewing experience. Work on the quilt will be accompanied by discussion of what the design means: a message of hope, peace, justice, understanding, etc., as determined in the initial design stage. Communities will have a chance to discuss what their own stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict means, and to join in a project shared by people with diverse backgrounds and opinions.

The final result will be both concrete and intangible: a finished work of art, a series of collaborations and discussions, and an online record of the full process. The completed quilt will be displayed before being sent to Ramallah.