Motherless Child

Motherless Child

Machine appliqué, hand and machine quilting. Cotton fabrics, threads, and shells. (41” x 48”)

Inspired by the horrific separation and inhumane treatment of migrant children at the southern border of the United States, Motherless Child features images of paper dolls (as they might have been arranged on a slave ship), a sale notice of small child (as well as other commodities), and the names of the top ten African tribes taken in the Atlantic Slave Trade.

Lastly, the mournful words of an African-American Spiritual, drift in the waters surrounding the African continent. The human tragedy at our southern border is certainly not the first time in American history when people were dehumanized, degraded and traumatized by family separation: The Slave Trade, Native American Indian Schools, Japanese Internment Camps, and now separation of innocent, vulnerable children from families seeking asylum. Clearly, we have not learned the lessons from our past, and so, the atrocities continue.

Déjà Vu

Glendora Simonson

2019