Laundry as healing: The Clothesline Project

The Art Gallery of Algoma (AGA) will be hosting a special week of art, storytelling and healing from February 24th until March 2nd.

The Clothesline Project was created by a small group of women who discovered a way to take the staggering, mind-numbing statistics on violence against women and turn them into a provocative, in your face, educational and healing tool.

Doing the laundry has always been considered women’s work, and in the days of close-knit neighbourhoods, women often exchanged information over backyard fences while hanging their clothes out to dry. The concept was simple, let each woman tell her own story, in her own unique way and hang it out for all to see. A way of airing society’s dirty laundry.

The Clothesline Project began in October 1990 with 31 shirts displayed as part of an annual Take Back the Night March in Massachusetts. Locally, the Clothesline Project was initiated by Women in Crisis and became a shared project with Algoma Family Servies.

For more information, contact Moya Morrow at the Art Gallery of Algoma at [email protected].

The Art Gallery of Algoma is located at 10 East Street.
For more information on the AGA call 949-9067 or email [email protected].