October 18, 2017
Chicago Tribune reported on American artist Aram Han Sifuentes who started sewing protest banner and arranging a “Protest Banner Lending Library”.
The fiber arts’ teacher started sewing protest banners with different slogans last year. It was her way to support protests without having to go to the streets herself, as she was still in the process of applying for citizenship. The artist had moved to the US with her family from South Korea when she was a child and grew up in California.
Establishing the “Protest Banner Lending Library”, she enabled others to go through a large list of already existing banners and to lend them for their own protests. Some of the banners Sifuente made herself, others were made by collaborators or one of the visitors of one of many workshops in Chicago or New York. Until mid-November, the Lending Library can be visited at the Alphawood Gallery in Lincoln Park, Chicago.
This project is an example of how one can support protest and a cause without going to the streets or taking risks he or she is not prepared to take. Others who are, can still benefit from this support! And besides this “practical” aspect, a lot of Sifuente’s projects are creative and humorous, another quality which can be useful in attracting people to a cause when trying to win over more supporters, for example.
To read more about the “Protest Banner Lending Library” and other creative projects by the artist, like a disco-themed polling booth for all those who cannot vote legally, follow this link.
Photo: Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune
