Josephine Lobato + Rita Crespin

Josephine Lobato + Rita Crespin
Guest Lecture 3/11/2008
UC 302 @ 1:40pm

Mother Josephine Lobato and her daughter Rita Crespin gave a lecture and demonstration on embroidery. They spoke of their heritage as tradition bearers, using a revitalized Spanish-colonial style – the Colcha. With each piece, they delve into their lineage and imagination, translating their stories into fiber.

Josephine spoke of how she became involved in embroidery: it “started by accident – like most good things”. She began with “The Tree of Life”, and found a “magic-stitch” that went anywhere you wanted it to. It is kind of like a couching stitch. Josephine then went on to speak of the general history of embroidery. For her, embroidery is a recording of events. These pieces hold meaning and stories. They are a documentation of memory, feeling, and life that starts with a narrative history which she then infuses with her own personal views and experiences. Women send messages all over the world with their stitches. They have always done miracles with very little. Arpilleras are an example – Arpilleras are:

"…small hand sewn and embroidered/embellished tapestries, created by women, most of whose relatives were among those listed as detained/disappeared during the military dictatorship in Chile. Arpilleras began as a means to record the women’s fruitless searches for their loved ones and to function as a means of remembrance…For these women, arpilleras were a way of recording both their grief over the disappearance of their loves ones and the brutality that occurred as a result of Pinochet’s rule of Chile. The materials for these tapestries were often donated; however, many times remnants of the disappeared person’s clothing were used to represent them on the arpillera."

AgosIn, Marjorie. Tapestries of Hope, Threads of Love: The Arpillera Movement in Chile, 1974-1994. Albuquerque: University of Mexico Press, 1996.
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From the Reviewer:
After the lecture, Josephine and Rita had some embroidery kits prepared for us so we could try it ourselves. We used strands of yarn untwisted into smaller “threads” which we used to embroider. Here is a picture of my classmate, Sooin, working diligently to thread the needle:

I enjoyed the embroidery session; people in the audience were socializing while they worked, and others were in silent concentration, likely thinking to themselves – or at least I was. We were free to express ourselves through needlework – the fabric sections in the hoops were for the most part blank. Josephine and Rita had patterns and marking tools available for our use, and encouraged freedom to draw/illustrate whatever we wanted.
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There are particular phrases from Josephine and Rita that I caught and thought are worth sharing:

“Don’t worry about what you draw or being so exact. It’ll come through when you get into the material.”

“Doesn’t matter if you’re an artist or not, matters that you get the story out.”

“In art, follow your heart – not your pencil – let your imagination take you.”

“The older you are the less input you have.”

“Education opens doors – especially for women.”

“Women have had to express themselves in different ways…through arts and crafts…”

“Everyone has creativity in their own way – it just takes time for it to mature and come out.”

“Whatever you do, don’t go back – keep going.”

“If you’re ready to learn, somebody’s ready to teach you.”

“To be creative, put yourself fully into it.”

-C. Szarkowski