Framed AP Voter Registration Card Counted Cross-stitch Kit and Sampler

From the Artist: Locked at home in 2020, people used crafts to cathartically occupy their time. However, at any major craft store, the embroidery kit inventory exclusively promotes white, Western, conservative narratives/motifs that reinforce identity stereotypes. They exclude diverse voices/themes and other embroidery cultures. Though seemingly benign, the craft’s permanent home placement makes it a powerful influencer. With the last year’s efforts to rectify racial/social inequalities, crafts that only reinforce white narratives are counterproductive to social justice.

The Stitch n’ Bitch Kit Project’s mission is to disrupt these visual and symbolic constraints. The project aims to modernize, democratize, and decolonize mass-produced/consumer-based embroidery kits. The submitted sampler and its supporting DIY kit addresses one of this past year’s most pressing issues – voting. For example, the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, the 2020 election, and voting rights and equalities across the United States. Women celebrated the centennial of the 19th amendment as a result of suffragism – the same year the first woman-identifying and BIPOC vice president was voted into office. And yet access to voting and concerns over voting equality remains rampant today through gerrymandering, poll intimidation, voter registration issues, etc.

Voting was part of the most contentious issues of 2020, so much so, that former President Trump claimed unproven widespread voter fraud to the extent that he spurred conspiracy theories and encouraged rioters to storm the US capital during the certification of President Biden’s presidential win. Georgia saw a change in state voting preferences with the help of Stacey Abrams empowering voters and President Trump unscrupulously pressured Georgia’s Secretary of State to find votes in his favor. The Voter Registration Card kit is a way for collectors to express their experiences about voting this past year or overall.