[This is an excerpt of an article from a new blog series posted on Substack. Notes from the Labyrinth, a RCWMS blog, is written by Claire Hambrick, RCWMS Art Coordinator and 50th Anniversary Curator. For the full article, click here.]
Late on a hot August day in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, in the final weeks of a four-month run of the textile exhibition Stitching Our Stories, warm light from Cassilhaus pours out into the surrounding woods. The sun is just starting to set, and waves of art lovers from all over the state file into the home-based gallery. Tonight, the exhibition’s three main artists will captivate a diverse audience with their art and reflect on stories of connection, ancestry, and fabric. Their words dance throughout the exhibit space, floating into the second story gallery where their quilts are hung with exquisite attention to detail. This main gallery presents a feast of colors, textures, and emotion, inviting viewers into connection, reflection, and imagination. It’s a marvel to think that just five months ago, this exhibition was a seed of an idea.
Since the early 2000s, the Resource Center for Women & Ministry in the South (RCWMS) has expanded its focus to include arts and creativity, recognizing the pivotal role that the arts play in spirituality and liberation. In my new job as Arts Coordinator & 50th Anniversary Curator, I spend a lot of time diving deep into past projects, like 2006’s Art and the Feminine Divine festival and 2008’s documentary film about the late artist Meinrad Craighead. Since I joined this organization in the fall of 2024, I learn about most of these pivotal art projects in retrospect (after all, this organization turned twenty-six when I was born in 2001!). But in the Spring of 2025, one of our most exciting creative projects took place, and I was lucky enough to be part of every step of the process. As a photographer by trade, I took the initiative to document this six-month endeavor, which I share with you here.
Phase One: Scrappy Beginnings
For those who’ve never been part of curating an exhibition, you may be wondering the same question my team and I were pondering in February of 2025: How on earth does one pull off an immersive art exhibition in three months?
As with many RCWMS-sponsored projects, we learn as we go. That’s the ethos RCWMS founder and leader Jeanette Stokes has infused into every project over the decades. For context, we’re a small non-profit with a rotating staff, often made up of current or former seminary students, college students, or, in my case, creatives interested in spirituality and community who happen to wind up in the magical web of RCWMS.
[End of excerpt. Read the full article for free on our Substack by clicking here.]
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