Quilt made of tobacco cloth and plaid shirts
My grandfather's plaid shirts
Fall Process Book printed on linen and sewn together
Fall semester process book cover
In 2023, my grandfather passed away from a life of smoking cigarettes and his closet of exclusively plaid button-down shirts were passed down to me. Growing up with family members who were addicted to nicotine deeply influenced my negative view on tobacco. Sun-Cured History and Plaid Memories aims to shift my perspective by exploring the history of the tobacco plant and its connections to politics and culture, both in its place of origin, Central America, and in my home region of North Florida and the Piney Woods Belt. Long used by Native Americans for spiritual and recreational purposes, tobacco, often referred to as 'brown gold,' became a key motivator for European colonization in the Americas. This demand has been supplied by centuries of slave labor and exploitation of vulnerable communities. Historical images sourced from local and national archives illustrate the role of southern companies like Swisher International, where my great grandmother worked, in shaping this narrative. These images are developed onto cloth used to cover ‘shade tobacco,’ grown in the region, then toned with four types of locally grown tobacco and embellished with gold embroidery. Alongside these visuals, I repurpose my grandfather’s 27 plaid shirts into quilt squares historically rooted in the southern US, depicting motifs of tobacco leaves, industry, and agriculture.
