Craft in America

I never really thought of myself as a writer until I decided to write my autobiography, couldn't get it published and then I started to just write more and more and more and I think that I'm glad that I understood that nobody can tell you you can't write or can't paint or can't whatever. You just keep doing it and if you keep doing it, it's going to be good work eventually or you're going to stop yourself because who knows is you really and so I don't recall any of my professors ever saying that, you know my writing was exemplary or anything but I had something to say and I figured as an artist I have a story to tell and I think I need to also tell it in words as well as images. I think so and so I did. I didn't ask anybody's permission. I just did it. In 1990, she created a work called Tar Beach. She wrote her story right on the quilt and she created what is now known as story quilts and it's particular to Faith. She basically created and invented story quilts. These are paintings. These are not quilts. Tar Beach, my first book came from the story quilt. They liked the story so they wanted me to do a book and I had already written the words because the words are on the story quilt so they just sent me a dummy book and put the words on each one of 32 pages and I just went back and illustrated each one of those pages. My second book my editor said what about Harriet Tubman? I said nice, okay. so now my job is what about Harriet Tubman. Then when I can tell the story of who was Harriet Tubman, what did she do that was important, I get my characters and then the third thing is the dialogue and when I get all of that done, that's my story, that's my process, the way I do it.