Witches, Textiles, and Songs

This Saturday, March 23, at 1 p.m., the Allentown Art Museum’s Dynamic Conversations series will feature Angela Fraleigh, professor of art at Moravian, and Claire McRee, the museum’s associate curator. They will discuss Frahleigh’s work Threaded with Moonlight, which is on exhibit through April 21. Threaded with Moonlight draws inspiration from the extensive textile collection at the Allentown Art Museum and the historical connection of textiles to female labor. The series comprises three large-scale paintings and a set of smaller works that delve into the themes of spinning, stitching, and weaving as expressions of empowerment.

The conversation will explore Fraleigh’s research and artistic process, her use of art-historical source material, the making of the current exhibition, and how her work engages with traditions of witchcraft.

Although the talk is free, the museum asks that you RSVP ahead of time.

As prelude to the Dynamic Conversation, beginning at 12:30 p.m., Moravian University’s choral group Vocalis will perform three pieces by twentieth-century German composer Paul Hindemith.

Throughout history, in many folkloric traditions, women often sang into their weavings with the hope that their work would carry their blessings. Some of these practices live on today. In Ukrainian culture, for instance, in a ritual that begins on the Saturday preceding the ceremony, seven women gather to knead dough and sing folkloric wedding songs into the bread that will be eaten at the celebration.