History
The Transmissions Quilt Project started with the simple impulse to make affirming gift objects for trans friends and lovers. It is now blossoming with the hopes of sharing these objects with broader community. As it grows, the impulses are the same: welcome trans people to themselves, shower them with gifts, and offer the reminder that the web of life holds them fiercely.
(the first person in this narrative refers to artist Cordy Joan)
Chapter 1
This project came into being three years ago when a lover shared the blanket they had been given to celebrate their birth. With their dead name emblazoned across one corner in purple, they shared the grief that came with relating to an object that didn’t feel like it was actually made for them.
This spurred me to make them a quilt in the hopes of welcoming them into their current self.
From there, I went on to make a series of these quilts for trans friends. Not baby blankets, per se, but arrival objects. The piece that sees and welcomes them. I made six more.
Chapter 2
We now find ourselves beginning the next iteration of this project. After getting the feedback that this project has legs and could be shared with broader community, we’ve gathered a team and developed a process that makes these available to people we don’t yet know.
People are nominated to receive a quilt. As we make their quilt, they get to choose trans and queer loved ones to help. They are also encouraged to invite broader community together to a culminating quilting bee, where we gather to put finishing stitches into the quilt in an evening of food and gossip.
Further down the line, these quilts and the various elements made along the way will be exhibited. The steps of this project are crafted to mirror the variety of ways that trans people come to know and locate themselves in the broader social weave. A culminating exhibit is one version of this locating.
