The three days were full of opportunities, presentations, stunning views, and the arts. I took notes at the sessions I attended and will attempt to recap for you now.

Alabama Textile Traditions

This panel of women spoke to Alabama’s long history of women working within both the formal and informal economies to provide for their families through sewing.

Fiber arts have long been a source of creativity, a declaration of self-determination, and a cornerstone of care.

photo from Recycled Runway 2023

Bib and Tucker Sew op https://bibandtuckersewop.org/

This business is unique not only in teaching the fiber arts, but being advocates for the industry and women. Recycled Runway is a program for Birmingham Middle and High School students. Their fashion show was in April, all items made from repurposed materials.

The March Quilts began in 2015 to commemorate the march from Selma to Montgomery marches. They decided to repeat it each year. Members  choose a civil or human rights theme and facilitate open sewing sessions and discussion.

Viola Ratcliff, program manager, 205-386-0575 viola@bibandtuckersewop.org

Black Belt Treasures Arts and Culture https://www.blackbelttreasures.com/

This is a nonprofit business in Camden, AL. They began in order to stimulate the economy with heritage arts and culture. They represent over 450 different artists.

One of the things I loved to see was the rehabilitation of an old car dealership where they now hold their classes. It’s a fabulous idea. There are many empty car dealerships in small towns, this is a great way to use the space.

Loretta Bennet https://www.facebook.com/lorettapbennett/

Loretta is an artist who said, “I was quilting before I was born.” She’s one of the quilters of Gee’s Bend. The quilts of Gee’s Bend are internationally renowned hand-made quilts made by a group of women and their ancestors who have lived in the isolated African-American community of Gee’s Bend, Alabama. The residents of Gee’s Bend are direct descendants of enslaved people who worked the cotton plantations of Joseph Gee established in 1816. The quilting tradition in Gee’s Bend goes back beyond the 19th century and some of the quilts have been exhibited at many notable museums.

Loretta shared that she is a participant in Vacation with An Artist Program.  (www.vawaa.com)  You can spend a week with her and sister and they teach the old methods. She shared they do quite a bit of work using old clothes from deceased people to make quilts in remembrance.

Takeaways from the panel:

1. Art, hands on textile art, is important to tourism, there are bus tours from all over the world that come for quilt tours.
2. Creation of this art and turning it into economic development benefits from the Idea Friendly Method.
3. Storytelling is done in many different methods. Quilting is one of those. There are barn quilts with tours in the Midwest, quilt shops that created an entire town in Missouri and it started from a youtube site that simply gave instruction.
4. Creating, quilting, is a good way to bring people together around a common theme. What else can be accomplished at these gatherings?

Small steps for work as a textile artist:

• Find fabric
  • Donated clothing and fabric
  • Work with the culture arts center
• Sell on Etsy
• Work together
  • Packing/shipping together
• Funds from vacation with an artist

Discuss your prices for handmade items:

• Labor
• Time
• Materials
• Love

Remember, it’s art. Price accordingly!

Foodways in Alabama

Sponsored by the Southern Foodways Alliance, this panel features Sarah Rodriguez, Southern Foodways Alliance’s lead oral historian, in conversation with three women who teach, preserve, and document diverse and changing foodways in Alabama.

Southern Foodways Alliance

A major theme at this conference was the importance of telling the stories of folklife in the South. Southern Foodways Alliance is capturing the stories. They are exploring the oral traditions and finding ways we are sharing our food stories. Visit their website, Southernfoodways.org and check out the videos.

Jai Williams, Southern Foodways Alliance

Jai specializes in culinary, travel, and cultural photography and was recently named as a Nathalie Dupree Fellow for the Southern Foodways Alliance (SFA.) She’s studying Black land ownership and cultural foodways throughout the South as well as documenting Mississippi’s rich history through visual media.

Again, the theme of telling the stories arises. Another way to do that is through photography.

Contact: Jaithephotog.com @iamjaithephotog

Lauren Murphy, seed saver, Hillfolk Pharmacy

Lauren is a young farmer and a seed saver. She realized while raising her special needs son that there had to be a better way to feed him. Food is medicine after all. She noticed that the seeds she had from the past were not as badly affected by the drought. gut-healing herbalist, soil-steward and traditional foods enthusiast trained in Southern Folk Medicine by Phyllis Light at the Appalachian Center for Natural Health, and in Sociology from Florida State University.

Lauren is a natural teacher and storyteller. You can listen to her on this Native Habitat Podcast session.

Hillfolkfarmacy.com (and Instagram account)

Lauren Richards, Albertville High School Culinary Arts Program

Lauren shared about how her culinary school kids discussed traditions in food, then created fusion meals. They didn’t know that the old rules say you can’t do that. It’s exciting to see what our youth are creating while using the old traditions. Just another way to tell a story!

https://www.facebook.com/ahsculinarydepartment/

Takeaways from the panel:

1. Food is medicine.
2. Food is another avenue to storytelling.
3. ‘If we don’t eat, we don’t meat’ rings true.
4. Food allows us to be daring, to try new (and old) things.
5. Food is a safe place to gather, and to learn our stories.

A quick thank you and good bye to Bill Mansfield

Bill Mansfield, NEA leader National Endowment for the Arts is retiring. He told us he welcomes calls now through end of July for touching base and answering questions.

They gave out 28.8 million in 1,231 grants last year, many to Native Arts and culture. Bill said no one is perfect but keep trying. “I don’t master the work; I master the tools.”.

One of the stories he shared was how Charleston, WV triangle district was wiped out by highways. It was once the center of black music and culture. In 1974 the area was demolished. Thousands were forced to move, because of underlying racism.

Sadly, this is not a singular story. Black Wall Street in Tulsa was the site of a massacre, white on black, and they rebuilt. Then the highways were placed into that area and Black Wall Street was gone. San Francisco neighborhoods in the 1960’s were seized with imminent domain and razed, affecting at least 20,000 people. This federally funded urban renewal movement was not just in big cities either. Greenville, NC, Tupelo, MS, Demopolis, AL were all affected. Read more in this article in the Boston Review.

Bill, may you enjoy retirement and keep on being creative!

Folklife and the Future

Alabama artists and activists Sehoy Thrower, Mary Godfrey, and Susan Walker engaged in conversation around how their present work is shaped by a dynamic vision of their community’s future.

Sehoy Thrower, Poarch Band of Creek Indians

Sehoy spoke of how the Creek were moved out of their homelands. “Our diaspora got changed, against our will.”

They  used the native plants and are trying to bring them back. It’s hard to be optimistic when you look at their land. Biodiversity is plummeting. Rivercane is gone, invasive species bamboo overtook it

Folklife traditions are the thread that never ended

Creek are a people of fire, inner and outer. Creeks have one foot in the past and one in the future.

Quilt (apologies for bad picture)

Mary Godfrey, Lowndes County Community Life Center

Lowndes County worked on the quilt project. They asked, ‘who are your people?’

Mary shared that in the quilting environment “only love [is] there.” Winnie McQueen said in a video “your name will never be forgotten.”

It’s not meant to harm; it is meant to heal, the telling of the stories. Quilters often sing when they sew.

“Happiness is very fleeting – joy lasts.”

Susan Walker, Sew Their Names Project

She restored a church from 1843, that her grandfather owned – along with the slaves. The Sew Their Names Project added the names of the slaves to the quilt they did. It was hard to find the names of slaves, sometimes just used numbers

Susan said, “Can’t have reconciliation without the truth.”

When you view the quilt, look at the left side– it’s happy white people. Then look at the right side – all slavery images.

A traveling exhibit of this quilt is coming and with songs. Then will be permanently displayed in Lowndes County.

Takeaways from this panel:

1. Will we ever learn? The treatment of the natives and the slaves was horrendous. What can we do going forward to rectify this?
2. You can’t have reconciliation without the truth. It begins with telling and hearing the stories.
3. We must take care of our Earth. We simply must, before we can’t.

Panayotis League, fiddler

Panayotis League, fiddler

Panayotis is from Tarpon Springs in Florida, and a Greek. He told of the Greek sponge divers and merchants from the Aegean islands who came to Tarpon Springs FL in 1906.

He shared songs on his fiddle. The melodies are associated with place, Kalimos and Kos. In Mobile AL were the Greeks from Crete. In New Orleans the Greek community were in the New World around 1760

“When my old people started dying was when I woke up to how amazing this music was” Panayotis said.  

Takeaway from Panayotis:

1. After he was done with his session, he went with a young man to a lobby area. He proceeded to teach him how to play his fiddle in the way of the location. In other words, he took a bluegrass song and played it like a Greek song. He was patient, kind, happy to be teaching.
2. He’s not just a fabulous musician, but a storyteller, a teacher and makes one love music even more.
3. The stories matter.

Real Meaning of Dia de Muretos

Day of the Dead altar

Mónica S. Sánchez, from the Cazateatro Bilingual Theatre Group led this workshop. The Day of the Dead is a celebration of life.

“Music and food make everything better.”

Monica had set up an elaborate altar. The Altar is set up in 7 levels, and she shared what goes on each level.

Takeaway from Monica:

1. Her excitement as a theater person was engaging. Where else can we be that excited in our lives?
2. It’s important to honor the dead, in the way each of us does in our traditions.
3. It’s all about remembering the people and the stories.

Appleshop Short Film Stories

Ethan Payne frightenedmedia.com

He directed the Appleshop films we previewed. I was busy watching the films, and feeling just like I was back in Jackson County, KY. Here’s the description from the agenda:

Appalshop recently completed four short films documenting regional Appalachian traditional artists. This series captures, archives, and amplifies the stories behind the craft. Our focus was in the following mediums: traditional music, storytelling, crafts, woodworking, and foodways. Appalshop’s documentary work has from the beginning told authentic stories of Appalachia, working from within the community to banish stereotypes and misrepresentations. The short films in this series are:

Bright Morning Stars: The Johnsons of Hemphill

That Tree Lives On: A Film About Terry Ratliff

Lady D

Full of Wonder: The Art of Angie DeBord

Takeaway from the films:

1. It’s never too late to make a difference.
2. You are never too young to belong and do things.
3. The stories matter.

Music

I recorded a little bit from the performers I saw.

Greek Fiddle

Panayotis League 

Gary Waldrep Band

Bluegrass

The Gary Waldrep Band performed an hour of traditional bluegrass music. Gary Waldrep, the founder, is from Kilpatrick, Alabama. He has participated in the Alabama State Council on the Arts apprenticeship program and touring arts program.

Gary Waldrep Band – Bluegrass

The Blues

For years, blues artists have not only performed the traditional art of African American Roots music but also utilized the methods of folklorists to preserve and share the Blues People’s narrative. This panel features Alabama’s traditional Blues artists who have participated in apprenticeships, created nonprofit organizations, and more to ensure preservation.

• 

  Blues Performance

  Jock Webb

• DieDra Hurdle-Ruff
• Keithen Ruff

Blues Musicians 

Follow FITS partners on social media and visit the websites for updates:

• South Arts
  • com/southarts
  • Instagram: @southartstradarts and @southartsorg
  • Twitter: @southarts
• Alabama Folklife Association
  • com/AlabamaFolklife
  • Instagram: @alabamafolklife
  • Twitter: @AlabamaFolklife
• Alabama State Council on the Arts
  • com/AlabamaStateCouncilontheArts
  • Instagram: @alabama_arts
  • Twitter: @Alabama_Arts
• American Folklore Society 
  • com/AmericanFolkloreSociety
  • Instagram: @americanfolkloresociety
  • Twitter: @afsfolklorists

Join the next gathering 2023 American Folklore Society Annual Meeting, November 1-4, in Portland, Oregon.

If there is no accreditation on the photo, it means Deb Brown took it.

Dorrigo in New South Wales, Australia, population 1100, created an entire event to support local makers. David from the Red Dirt Distillery told us about Made in Dorrigo Day, where everything offered for sale had to be made, grown or produced in their local 2453 postcode area.

Back in 2014 when they started, David said, “Like with everything, it is just up to a few individuals to run the whole show BUT, we are doing something and it does make a difference.. even if it isn’t a “roaring success, financially” it does provide all those other immeasurable things – pride in community, and even [the feeling of] “community” sooooo important in our small (struggling) towns…”

As I write this in 2021, they’re still doing Made in Dorrigo Markets several times a year. They’ve taken small steps to build something meaningful out of their local arts, crafter, makers and manufacturers.

Holding “Made in” events helps redefine how people see your town. We just aren’t aware of how many different things are made, grown or produced locally. Getting them all together in one place can really make an impression on people’s thinking.

You’ll be influencing the growth of your future maker entrepreneurs and your future creative workforce.

Bonus: This would make a great tie in with MFG Day or Manufacturing Day in October.

Get more ideas for building your local maker economy with SaveYour.Town’s rural craft entrepreneurship video.

This is the story of Avard, Oklahoma, a town that knows how to make something out of nothing. Often listed as a ghost town, their population was never more than 300, and has declined since the 1950s. Avard is the kind of creative place where they wanted to raise money to restore their little lake that had dried up, so they sold dehydrated fishing licenses–good for all the dehydrated fish you could catch from the dry lake. Something from nothing!

In the 2000s, almost all of the 33 residents played a role in the Avard Folk Festival to bring cowboy and pioneer folk arts and crafts to life. Over 100 artists came from all across Northwest Oklahoma. Traditional musicians performed while craftspeople showcased their rope making, candle making, quilting and blacksmithing. They put on a trail ride, a dutch oven cook off, and an old fashioned baking and canning fair.

One of the organizers, Donna Schmidt said their goal was to preserve these arts by supporting the current artists, as well as providing exposure and hands-on experience to everyday people in a fun setting. They attracted over 500 attendees to their little “ghost town” and kept it going for several years.

That’s a terrific example of using what you already have, right down to the dry lake bed. In our Idea Friendly Method, this is the Take Small Steps part, and it focuses on creating more opportunities for your craft entrepreneurs.

Get the full video: Crafters Create Prosperity

This video clip is a sample from the SaveYour.Town video on rural craft entrepreneurship: Crafters Create Prosperity.

Your town has people and assets to build on. You have local crafts, local arts, and people who make things. We’re going to give you practical steps you can take to use what you have and what you make to create prosperity.

Find out more

More articles for arts and crafts entrepreneurship

Overcoming the Challenges of Craft Vending in Small Towns – Jeriann Ireland shares her story as she steps up from a craft hobby towards a craft business.

10 Tips for Increasing Your Sales at Art and Craft Shows – micro biz enthusiast Glenn Muske has 10 tips to get more money coming at shows.

Donna Maria on wholesaling your products – helping you think through the process of growing beyond shows.

The culture of Alva, Oklahoma, comes from the people who live here influenced by the characteristics of this place. Photo by Becky McCray

Lots of small towns have a good handle on the importance of the arts. Some have arts councils and arts festivals, and most are starting to better value rural artists. What about the larger concept of culture? Culture is usually only mentioned around urban areas. Rural is almost thought of as the opposite of “cultured.”

One definition I’ve heard of art is how people make meaning for themselves. That’s pretty good, I think. People create things that make meaning out of their lives and surroundings. Culture includes that and more.

Culture is the intersection of people and place. 

When a particular group of people live in a particular place, they create ways of doing things that are their culture: Finding, growing and preparing food; making music; designing buildings; decorating themselves and their clothing; furnishing their surroundings; doing business with each other and surviving the weather. All of these elements of culture exist in rural places.

People living in a place developed a culture that drew from the characteristics of the place itself to create new ways that make life better, easier, richer. When new people arrive, they bring their culture with them, and they interact with the local culture and the place, enriching the mix. When people of different cultures meet in a place, each is influenced by that place and by each other.

Culture is not about preserving a static version of our past ways only for tradition. Culture is a reservoir of shared experiences, a toolkit that equips us to thrive and adapt.

Culture helps us prosper in the future. We bring forward our ways that define us and our place even as we adapt, adopt new ways or even move to a new place.

This is the real reason we teach our culture to our children. It’s not just folk songs or crafts, it’s people, places and our special ways. These are important because they connect us to the past and the future and to this place where we are now.

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I’m not saying you can’t have historical murals. I’m just saying you can have future murals, too. Photo by Becky McCray, from Kingfisher, Oklahoma.

Every town needs a future mural, or a series of them.

Seems like every small town has a history-themed mural, but very few have a future-themed or even modern-style mural.

Many towns use old photos as displays, including in empty buildings. They do get people talking about what you used to have. But how are you engaging people in talking about what you will become? 

If every single display depicts your past, what is showing your future?

For every historic image, do a one-to-one match with a future image.

We spend enough time reminding people our town has a past. We don’t spend enough time reminding people our town has a future.

Update: Colfax did a future mural!

Colfax, Washington, took this idea and now it has a robot mural! It’s kind of a retro future take on American Gothic with robots set in their local landscape.

Photo by Sarah McKnight

Colfax also has a historic mural, showing the town as it was in the 1880’s. It did look a little lonely, surrounded by a big stretch of blank wall.

Photo by Becky McCray

Here’s their update. The blank wall now has a bright colorful design all the way across, framing the existing mural. They say the Palouse region of Washington State is the American Tuscany, full of rolling hills, farm fields and wildflowers. This mural really makes the most of that.

Photo by Sarah McKnight

Did you do a future mural? Send me pics!

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Every small town has some empty windows downtown. Some are empty buildings, some are buildings being used for storage, and some are service businesses that just don’t have a lot to put in their windows. Here are three ideas I saw on my trip through Cowlitz County, Washington.

Make a mini-museum.

Work with the local museum to make a temporary display in the windows. This works even for tiny outdoors display cases, which you sometimes see on old jewelry store buildings. The photo at the top is a mini-museum display I saw in Castle Rock, Washington.

Put in a white picket fence

This picket fence was also in Castle Rock. The service business inside didn’t have a lot to put in their windows, so they filled them with this attractive alternative.

Doodle on the windows

An artistic person with some window chalk put these wonderful vines in the window in downtown Kelso, Washington. Much better than just an empty window.

If you’re interested in filling empty buildings, have you thought about dividing them up into shared spaces? 

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Local art can fill up empty windows in small towns, bringing more life and activity to downtown. Photo by by Toni Henry

Many small towns have a challenge of too many empty buildings or too many buildings used only for storage.

In one small town, the problem was an existing store that was using a neighboring building for storage, but had nothing in the windows. In another town, it was a building used for storage by a moving and storage company. They have just plain curtains in the front windows. Lots of buildings are up for rent, so they have nothing in the window except a “for lease” sign. None of these is adding anything positive to the downtown, and they actually make it feel less full.

To bring more life and activity to your downtown, you have to get something interesting in those otherwise empty windows. 

Toni Henry sent this story of filling empty windows in her small town, and it’s one that any small town could copy.

In the small town of East Brady, Pennsylvania, (population 950) there are several vacant store fronts. In October a building owner gave permission for volunteers to clean-up the façade of one of her buildings and to dress up the windows with local artwork. The project cost our East Brady Area Development Corporation (a non-profit made up of volunteers) a total of $100 for a sign, a blind on the door (to hide the interior), several plexiglass frames for identification of artists and their work and small heaters to prevent condensation on the windows.

Since putting out some free PR requesting artists to participate we have showcased at least 20 artist’s works. The displays have changed often and the month of November we dedicated one window to High School art – great collaboration with the local school!. That window was changed out recently to holiday art. We are hoping to get elementary school art for February and the high school wants to participate again in March. The artists have been excited about the opportunity to showcase their work and show up to assist in changing the exhibits. A feel good low cost project!!

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Even buildings used for junk storage can dress up their windows and contribute positively to your downtown. Photo by Becky McCray

Every small town has empty buildings downtown. Whether they are completely empty or just used for storage, they can make your downtown look vacant. If the building has windows, though, there’s an opportunity to dress them up a bit and maybe even promote another business at the same time.

In the picture above, a building used for storage is also being used to advertise another business that’s located across town. Here’s a previous display in the same windows:

Rather than leave the windows bare, the owner rented just the window display space to a retail store. Photo by Becky McCray

In Elkhart, Kansas, I saw two more good examples. For one, they made a custom banner to hang in the window and make it look like boxes in a display window:

The illusion of looking and seeing boxes stacked gives this ad more attention-getting power. Photo by Becky McCray

That’s definitely better than just empty windows or another vacant building.

In another set of windows, a local business used promotional items they already had on hand:

This satellite business used existing advertising materials (signs, stand-ups and banners) to fill the windows of this empty building. Photo by Becky McCray.

At first, I didn’t realize the building was vacant because the windows looked so lively.

In Hollis, Oklahoma, Betty Motley told me how a local group printed special banners to hang in windows. They found images online to use. This one is an empty building with an old-fashioned barber shop theme.

It’s all an illusion. There is no barbershop, no barber pole. That’s all on banners hung inside the windows.  Photo via Betty Motley

They even painted the door with barbershop lettering to complete the illusion. They also did another building using an antiques store as the theme.

Stacey Colledge from Central City, Iowa, sent me the photos below. They used historic photos of actual old-time businesses in their town, and printed them on static cling material so they can be moved when a building gets rented. A total of 9 has cost them about $2,000, she said.

Volunteers proudly pose with one of their historic photo window clings. Photo via Stacey Colledge

Not only did they put the window clings up, they put out a welcome mat, too! Photo via Stacey Colledge

Look into the future

So far, we’ve seen windows that featured businesses from the past and present, but what about businesses from the future? You know your town has a past, but do you spend enough time reminding people that your town has a future?

Here’s one town that did. Longview, Texas, used a window decal to show a vision of the building occupied by a future business.

This building would make a great boutique hardware store! Photo via Kevin Green, News-Journal Photo.

Read more about this one at the Longview News-Journal.

Window displays don’t have to be all business. They could be creative, too. Renton, Washington, did a series of window displays featuring a fairy tale theme.

Art is a smart way to dress up windows of empty buildings. Photo via Tory Franklin

Read more about it at the Renton Reporter.

Filling Your Empty Buildings

You don’t have to stop with decorating the windows. You can actually fill empty buildings with business, no matter how small your town is. Join Deb Brown and me for a 2-part webinar on Filling Empty Buildings at SaveYour.Town. The deadline to register is June 19, 2018.

If you stand in the right place and line up the courthouse, you will see all of the other buildings that were there in 1920. Sign by Doug Mackenzie.

Two art projects that are kind of cousins caught my attention as tools for small towns.

First is from reader Doug Mackenzie. It’s metal sign that, if you stand in the right place and line up the courthouse in the center, it shows the other historic buildings from the town of Marshall, North Carolina. (See the photo above.)

Any small town could make a similar metal sign to show former local landmarks, or just how things have changed over the years. Good for residents and visitors alike.

Second is from Witt Siasoco, called the Mobile Tracing Unit. It invites people to trace the outline of an actual building in their neighborhood of Minneapolis. (See the photo below.) Learn more about it at Drawing on Minneapolis.

I tried it out at the recent AMIBA Conference. I found it clever and engaging.  It’s a way to get people thinking and talking about the buildings in their neighborhood, a not-scary tool for getting local people involved in planning.

How have you used art to change how people view your town?
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The Mobile Tracing Unit by Witt Siasoco invites people to draw outlines of local buildings and at the same time think about the buildings all around them.