Welcome to the TextileX resource guide—a growing effort created to map out and connect the vibrant textile community and resources in the Portland metro area and beyond. The foundation of this guide was built from the diversity of organizations that participate in the Portland TextileX Month festival every October.
Development of and funding for this guide have been provided by Textile Hive with additional funding from a RACC catalyst grant in 2019.
We encourage you to contribute additional resources through this form and consider becoming a member of TextileX to help further develop this resource guide as well as Portland TextileX Month.
Organizations
ELSO Inc
At ELSO, we provide culturally relevant STEAMED (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) education and leadership development opportunities that invite youth to Experience Life Science Outdoors. Our programs provide hands-on learning, mentorship, and career pathways. We aim to cultivate generations of innovators and problem solvers, fostering environmental literacy and scientific thinking from early childhood through young adulthood. ELSO is committed to creating a diverse future in STEAMED by providing opportunities and representation that inspire and empower.
classes community social justice workshops
Galleries
Gallery 114
Founded in 1990 as an artist's cooperative, Gallery 114 celebrates its strength and resilience as a gallery that provides opportunities for artists to exhibit with complete artistic freedom. It inspires its members to push their limits and take their ideas to unexpected and challenging places. Whether we are exhibiting 2D, 3D, sculpture, video art and more, you will find artistic exceptional innovation at Gallery 114. Our neighborhood (the Pearl District) is Portland’s playground, ideal for strolling, shopping, dining and enjoying many other fine galleries. Our juried and guest-artist exhibits give the gallery an ever-expanding and national scope. We also welcome plays, lectures, readings, musical performances and film screenings. Gallery 114 is a Proud Member of Portland Coalition of Art Collectives. The arts uniquely empower the creative vitality of every identity. G114 understands that America's cultural vocabulary is due to its diversity and that all cultures are vital to the arts and the promotion of a culturally democratic world. We recognize that cultural diversity includes language, ethnicity, race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and range of ability and age. We aim to create and adhere to policies that increase and support diversity within our organization and monthly shows, and we seek to enhance member understanding of diversity issues in order to achieve our mission.
film gallery performance social justice talks visual art
Schools
Social Justice Sewing Academy
Founded in 2017, the Social Justice Sewing Academy (SJSA) is a non-profit organization that aims to empower individuals to utilize textile art for personal transformation, community cohesion, and to begin the journey toward becoming an agent of social change. Prior to COVID-19, youth workshops and programs were at the core of the organization.Through a series of hands-on workshops in schools, prisons, and community centers across the country, SJSA used social justice and art education to bridge artistic expression with activism. Many of our young artists made art that explored issues such as gender discrimination, mass incarceration, gun violence, and gentrification. The powerful imagery that youth created in cloth demonstrated their critique of issues plaguing their local and larger communities. These quilt blocks are then sent to volunteers around the world to embellish and embroider before being sewn together into quilts to be displayed in museums, galleries, and quilt shows across the country.
While youth programming remains at the heart of SJSA, the civil rights movement of 2020 and the concurrent COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted SJSA’s programming. Due to no longer being able to provide in-person programming and limited virtual youth workshops, SJSA launched a series of new initiatives to critically respond to the times. With each project, SJSA bridges the differences between age, race,and socioeconomic status to facilitate conversations about and encourage action toward social justice issues in households across the country.
community social justice textile art
Studios
Vo Vo
Vo Vo (they/them) explores support strategies and models of community care within a post-traumatic social landscape, focusing on the resilience of BIPOC, LGBTQIA2S+ and disabled communities. They are editor of an internationally renowned publication, speaker, educator, curator, artist and musician who has exhibited and toured in Australia, Germany, Indonesia, The Netherlands, Singapore, Croatia, Mexico, Finland, Denmark, New Zealand, Vietnam, Sweden, Malaysia, and the States. In their transdisciplinary art, they work in textiles, embroidery, audio, video, weaving, and furniture building. Their installations seek to interrogate power dynamics, structural oppression, challenge histories and realities of imperialism, white supremacy and colonization.
community performance social justice visual art