Day 6: Flourishing

We finally got underway with the jewelry making class with our embroidered pendants. Real talk, there are times I create class projects that don’t turn out as I expect. It either has to do with the women’s skills not being fully developed or the technique is too technical for them. The pendants are the opposite of this problem. They turned out even more beautiful than I expected.

The pendants showcase the women’s skill with the embroidery. You can see that the women use different techniques to accomplish different looks. Before today’s class, my knowledge of embroidery was woefully lacking. I knew the women were talented, but I thought there was just one stitch. I was wrong.

Emboridered Butterfly Pendant

Embroidered Butterfly Pendant

As I waited for the women to finish their embroidery circles, I listened to them swap advice and ideas for how to accomplish a different look. “Is that *stitch I’ve never heard of*? I like it.” “Try *other stitch I’ve never heard of* to get it to look like this.” Clearly, the women are the experts in embroidery. They know what they are doing technically, but also understand when to apply the various stitches and techniques.

Flowers and butterfly by Elizabeth

Flowers and butterfly by Elizabeth

At one point they asked me to try to embroider something. I did so reluctantly, sitting next to master embroiderers, and I learned this- it is a lot harder than it looks. My piece looks like a child did it and even though the women were encouraging, my work was not up to par.

Pushing the creative muscle- yin yang pendant by Lia

Pushing the creative muscle- yin yang pendant by Lia

One thing I love about the pendants is they also gave the women an opportunity to be creative with their embroidery. Often the women are embroidering the same manta motifs day in and day out. These pendants let their creativity loose. There were many designs that didn’t make the cut (they insisted they weren’t good enough) but even those designs were a creative outlet. They stretched the women’s creative imagination and that is catalyst to growth.

What do you think of these pendants? Which is your favorite?

Day 5: Fresh Ideas

I arrived at the prison this morning geared up and ready to start our embroidered jewelry class. Unfortunately, today we hit a glitch because of a health fair in the women’s area of the prison. Doctors, who previously had come to take blood samples from the women, were back with the results and talking with the women about their health. Due to this, it was impossible for us to have our class today, although, I think tending to one’s health is the best reason to miss jewelry making class!

Even though we didn’t have class, I still showed the women the sample piece for today. My sample is a manta pendant, however the class project is actually an embroidered pendant (since I don’t know how to embroider I brought the manta to show them the general idea). I also brought them a sheet of pictures of other embroidered pendants so they could see the project in context. I was shocked at their enthusiasm!

To say they were excited is an understatement. The prospect of making embroidered pendants was thrilling to them. I bought natural colored cloth for them to embroider on but they swiftly suggested also using black so the colors would pop. They also spoke amongst themselves about the different techniques in the photos and what they thought would be most stunning on a pendant. One woman said, “You always bring us new and interesting ideas. This is really beautiful!”

We agreed that I would leave them the supplies and they would work on the embroidery over the weekend. On Monday we will construct the pendants and start our Monday project. This afternoon they are getting together to cut material and work together on their designs.

Although personally I am sad about not spending much time with the women today, I am happy that they are working together in a group independent of me. This gets them in the habit of working collectively and self-sufficiently, which is ultimately more sustainable. For this reason, missing the class today is actually good news!

After I left the women’s area I submitted my revised Education Plan to the administration and received my updated permission document. While we are having the leather working class, the previous professor is ill and we will be working with a new one. Yesterday I visited his workshop and we outlined the class projects and went to town to buy materials for the class.

A peek into our leather trainer's workshop

A peek into our leather trainer’s workshop

The new leather work, Alberto, is a wonderful artisan. He even has had his products sold at the International Folk Art Market with a group of Ayacuhan artisans (he couldn’t attend due to money). He participates in artisan fairs throughout Peru and internationally in other South American countries. My hope is that he can share his experience with the women of these events to help them understand how large fairs work and give them a greater sense of the Peruvian market.

We start leather class in 1 1/2 weeks!

Day 4: Santa Fe Recap

In the past several days I’ve spoken a lot about the International Folk Art Market in Santa Fe, yet I haven’t yet posted a formal recap on this blog. Today is that recap!

The Folk Art Market was an incredible experience, both at an organizational level and in regards to the potential for the women’s reach. I was accompanied by two volunteers, Vrnda, who is a member of our Board, and Micah, who is a close friend and long time supporter of Ruraq Maki.

New friends at the workshops

New friends at the workshops

I arrived in Santa Fe on Tuesday and attended a mandatory first-time artisan training on Wednesday, which focused on the the logistics of the market, tips for selling products, and networking with other artisans. On Thursday I attended an optional training that was sponsored by the knowledgable folks at By Hand Consulting. I participated in the track that focused on selling to a wholesale market, including exploring different types of markets, wholesale cost structures, and financial planning for wholesale relationships. Both days of training were extremely helpful for our long-term planning and will enable us to build strong wholesale relationships.

Vrnda and Micah after a long day of set up

Vrnda and Micah after a long day of set up

On Friday, Micah, Vrnda, and I spent the day setting up our booth and tagging our products. We also got to know our booth mates, Magdalena (joined by her husband Raul), who is a master sculptor from Oaxaca. Friday night was the first night of the market and is for people who are art collectors and enthusiasts (the entrance fee on Friday is $225). For us, Friday night was not our market, as our products are more for the general public, however, it was amazing to walk through the market and view the work of over 160 artisans from about the world.

Our booth mates, Magdalenda and Raul

Our booth mates, Magdalenda and Raul

Saturday and Sunday the market is more accessible for the general public and our sales picked up. These days were a great learning experience for us because we learned more about the customers at the market and what they are looking for. Most notably, we learned the ideal price points for products and what types of products people prefer. For us, that meant bags! We sold a lot of bags, sold out of one color of our bags, and almost sold out of one style! This information is valuable because it enables us to focus our efforts and resources on our best selling items.

Our manta display

Our manta display

Overall, our sales were less than we had hoped for but the most we have ever had in one event, by far. More valuable than money, though, is what we learned from the fair, which could otherwise have taken years to figure out.

Also, there were other valuable non-monetary benefits from the event! One was the workshops. Another was that Ruraq Maki was selected by the Folk Art Alliance to be interviewed on film and receive a professional copy of the interview. This video is a gift to us that we can use for anything we choose. For us, this is a tremendous gift, as non-profit videos often cost upwards of $1,000 to produce, and we can utilize this video to help us sell the women’s products.

Being interviewed for a video!

Being interviewed for a video!

Another benefit of the event is that we did connect with wholesale buyers, some of whom purchased samples of our products. For us, this is the start of building wholesale relationships which can propel the women’s work to the next level.
Finally, the most invaluable part of the event was meeting the other artisans and seeing their masterful art. The International Folk Art Market truly is an international community and we were so honored to be apart of it.

Day 3: Dreaming a Future

I mentioned in yesterday’s post that during my meeting with the women we did some work envisioning their ideal production model. I used a group coaching model called GROW which is a very simple, yet effective process, where we go through various aspects of a single topic. My role was to present the questions and document the women’s answers. The discussion was very generative as it enabled the women to specifically envision their future and discuss their options.

Here are the result of the discussion, in the women’s own words:

Goals for a production group:

“Our goals for the production group are to learn new things, have more orders, and create products in distinct product categories like jewelry, leather, embroidered clothing, and knit headbands. If we meet this goal, we would be able to work in a group, improve our art, improve the quality of our products, and increase our quality of life. What is most appealing about this goal is that with more work, we will earn more money, which we can use to help our children and benefit our families. Also, we can learn new things that we cannot learn after we are released. We will value our products more. The most important thing about this goal is having money to provide for our family. When we can give money to them, we feel good about ourselves. A successful production group would make us feel proud and would enable us to start a business. Success would look like having 4 orders a year (every 3 months) and earning enough to provide for our children and save money for ourselves and our release.”

Reality (current situation):

“The current situation is there is no work in the prison. Right now, drug trafficking is down. This affects the Ayacuchan economy. When there is no money in the jungle, there is no money in Ayacucho and no work for us. When there is work, we received partial and delayed payments. The current situation makes us feel bad. We are worries and stressed about money. This stress causes us to feel sick. When we work, we forget about our problems and being here. What we need most is work, work that pays a good wage and work that provides us with capital to use. The resources we have available are manta and some of us have inventory capital so they are prepared for  an order. Our challenges is the market in Ayacuhco- it is too unstable.”

Options:

“Some options for us are to focus on our local market, focus on having more buyers, and produce smaller, lower cost items. As a production group, we want an equal pay model. Well, actually it depends. Not everyone does the same work, so payment will be different for group work or individual work. Some work, that is group work, everyone should be paid the same. For other work, like personal work (like the embroidery), the person should be paid individually. And we want to have different prices based on the quality of the embroidery- if you embroider really well, you are paid more. In forming our group, we need to have people with different skills, like women from the sewing workshop and women who embroider really well.”

Way Forward (what’s next):

“For future trainings we want to learn about quality control, how to administer money in a group model, and how to cost our products- for ourselves so we earn enough and for the market.”

 

Note: this is a narrative summary of my notes of the group discussion and the points they agreed upon

Day 2: Somos Importantes

Somos importantes- We are important. This is what one of the women said after I told them how impressed the people at the International Folk Art Market were with their products. But I’m ahead of myself.

Today I had a meeting with a group of women who produced items for the Folk Art Market and are interested in being part of a long-term production group. We began with a recap of the Folk Art Market. Here I explained the logistics, costs, and told them about the volunteers who joined me. I also explained how the 20,000 people who attended the event saw their artwork and how these 20,000 people now know there is a group of women in prison in Peru who create beautiful embroidery. The women laughed gleefully at this, exclaiming, “We are famous!”.

At the market, many people asked me to pass on a message to the women: “You all are so talented and an inspiration to us.” When I told the women this, one exclaimed, “Somos importantes!” (We are important!). What is incredible about this moment is that it demonstrates the connection between how when the women’s work is valued, their self-esteem and sense of importance in our world strengthens. This is crucial for a group of women who are marginalized and looked down upon by society.

I also explained to the women which products sold best and why. The women were really interested in this topic and said they were, in some respects, grateful for the products that didn’t sell because they learned what to focus on in the future. This is such a powerful example of the women’s willingness to learn and push themselves to do better (Ser Grande).

The next topic we discussed were the areas in which we had problems with the order. From pieces not being completed to small details being left unfinished (like loose threads), I pointed out all the areas we fell short. One area was in the quality of the embroidery. Some of the embroidery was incredible, other embroidery was unskilled. I brought a few examples and the group was outraged by what I showed them. They picked the pieces apart, pointing out all the reasons the embroidery wasn’t good enough, including a few points I had missed. What we they realized is that they are the experts in embroidery. They decided that they need to carefully review all the products (even those that are not their own) so that their work as a group is the very best.

The next part of the talk was about how they envision their production model. This process was really generative and I will write a blog post about it tomorrow, as it warrants its own post!

Finally, I distributed reading glasses that I received at the Folk Art Market’s Artisan Resource Fair. This was the fun part because the women were trying on glasses, reading the eye exams I brought, and laughing at how each other looked. It was rewarding to see them finally get glasses, as many of them complain about not being able to see well.

My silly cat earrings, a gift from the women

My silly cat earrings, a gift from the women

Before I left I was admiring one of the women’s earrings. They were from a store that belonged to another woman (yes, they have small booths that are shops in the prison). The earrings are really silly- the front is the animal head and the back the animal’s behind. The women insisted that I pick out a pair as a gift.  As the women gave them to me, one hugged me and said, “I love you so much.” Sweetness, silliness, and authenticity were all bundled into this single moment, which made such a treasure to experience.