We are launching new workshops this year within the framework of the project Threads of the Diaspora: Weaving scraps of Palestinian heritage, to come together and create embroidery for the Palestinian cause. At the workshops from January to April, we will be collectively embroidering ”Dreams of a Palestinian Garden” without rubble, which we will be connecting to the central panel of the Palestinian dress from Gaza that we are putting together using the pieces from the fall workshops and those which you have sent in to us from home.

Each participant will be given one of the 20 pieces of the rolling garden that will be hung from the panel and the embroideries of “Threads of the Diaspora,” containing different motifs designed by the Spanish-Palestinian teacher and artist Maysun Cheikh Ali Mediavilla, who will be teaching the workshops. At the later workshops, participants will resume the embroidery work on these pieces until the collective work has been completed. It will be put on display with the Gazan dress panel at Casa Árabe.

The workshops/meetings will be held several Fridays per month at Casa Árabe from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m., from January 15, 2025 to April 30, 2025. They are defined as spaces for meeting and exchange. Those of you who have already participated in previous workshops will be able to come and start embroidering right away. For those of you who are coming to learn about it for the first time ever, there will be an introductory presentation (15 min) about tatreez in Palestinian history and culture, its regional variants, its dimensions and meaning, plus a practical embroidery session.

To round off the event, in April and May there will be a gathering to display the work and a round table discussion about the impact of the Nakba on Palestinian embroidery practices and techniques.

This program is supported by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID).