Black History Month Children's Play

The 8.5x11in sign. Handbills also looked the same.

Black History Month events are well underway at the ACLD libraries. As shown in my earlier blog post, you can see on the back of the 8.5x11in flyer just how many events are taking place.


At the Headquarters Library, an event was planned to be staged (literally) by the Star Center Children's Theater, a play entitled Tribute to Black History. I was asked to come up with a visual to promote the event on an 8.5x11in sign and quarter page handbills.


Because I had developed the quilt to be the central design motif to be applied to all the events, I wanted to utilize it in some fashion for this event as well.


Right off, I wanted to show a stage with curtain backdrop to "set the scene" for this theatrical event. Next, I wanted to find a way to work the quilt image in. While looking for stage backgrounds, I kept coming across movie theater stage screens that had the old dancing hot dog and soft drink on them, and that gave me the idea to place the quilt up on stage. So I found a good curtained stage and set my quilt up on it. 


Next, I decided that I wanted to play on the "star" idea by using a literal star dancing alongside the quilt. The star was meant not only to imply an actor on stage, but also to elude to the "Star Center Children's Theater." 


But I knew a plain star alone still needed that little something extra, so I decided to have the same star image cut out of the quilt shape, as if it had leapt out of the quilt--literally making history come alive on stage and taking place not in the past but now, in the present. The star had the quilt image contained within it and the larger quilt had a hole in it where the dancing star jumped out of. 


The idea is that the quilt--and black history by extension--isn't simply a relic of the past; it is continually being added to in the present. We are all part of this story, weaving our own new chapters into this history every day.