Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Call for Entries – Mermaids and Merwomen in Black Folklore

We thought we might bring you another angle on black mermaids...


The City Gallery at Waterfront Park in Charleston, South Caroline is seeking art quilts and art dolls inspired by the folklore and visual history of the black mermaid archetype. Some of the first tales of mermaids and merwomen were brought to the USA by slaves. Apparently black mermaids travelled with enslaved Africans to distant lands, comforting them in the holds of the slave ships that took them far away from their homeland. 


Artists are invited to share your visual interpretation of these myths by creating a Black Mermaid / Merwoman in an art doll or art quilt. The exhibition will be on view at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park in historic Charleston from 28 August to 28 October 2012. For more information, check out the City Gallery Waterfront Park website.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Did you know that mermaids are also present in indigenous Australian culture! More black mermaids!

Black Mermaid Productions said...

Thanks MermaidsDreaming.
We suspect it is you who also put the wonderful Giliring Giliring spirits images up on FaceBook. We're both Australian and we've never come across them before in Indigenous storytelling. We have to start researching it now. We REALLY appreciate you dropping in and letting us know.

Gloria Grandy said...

I've been dreaming, imagining and thinking mermaids ever since I heard about this project. I'm creating one of my own. You have a great blog.

Gloria Grandy
cre8tiveglory.blogspot.com

Black Mermaid Productions said...

Thanks, Gloria. We appreciate you stopping by our blog.
Are you entering your piece in the exhibition? It will be interesting to know what quilts and artworks the exhibition will attract under the "Black Mermaid" theme.

Kit Lang said...

the curator requested two of my pieces - here are links to them if you're interested:

http://kitlangfiberart.blogspot.ca/2012/07/Kit-LangBlack-Mermaids.html

and

http://kitlangfiberart.blogspot.ca/2012/08/Kit-Lang-Black-Mermaids-Art.html

Looking forward to the exhibition!

Black Mermaid Productions said...

Hi Kit
We're doing another blog post on the exhibition even as we speak. Hope it's okay to use your two pieces, Kit.
Thanks.