(PRINCETON, NJ) --The Arts Council of Princeton (ACP) presents In Conversation with textile artist and activist Diana Weymar and Timothy M. Andrews, art collector and major supporter of the ACP’s Artist-in-Residence program, on Tuesday, August 11 from 7:00pm to 8:30pm.   

This curated series of discussions is designed to celebrate and connect those who make art and those who love art. Click here to link into the free conversation via Zoom. This program is part of the ACP’s apART together initiative.

Diana Weymar grew up in the wilderness of Northern British Columbia, studied creative writing at Princeton University, and worked in film in New York City. While in residency with the ACP as the 2016 Anne Reeves Artist-in-Residence, Weymar created Interwoven Stories, a community-based narrative stitching project featuring hundreds of 3-hole fabric “pages”, stitched with memories, places, and people by members of the Princeton community. By 2019, Interwoven Stories had expanded to an international capacity with the original project in Princeton inspiring people around the world to join the collective narrative.

She is also the creator of The Tiny Pricks Project.  Contributors from around the world are stitching Donald Trump’s words into textiles, creating the material record of his presidency and of the movement against it. Tiny Pricks has received press in The New Yorker, BBC News, Financial Times, and more. The project is currently featured in Mixed Messages, a group show at Beacon Gallery (Boston, MA),  bringing together multiple artists and their work around the concept of sexual violence.

Tiny Pricks Project holds a creative space in a tumultuous political climate. The collection counterbalances the impermanence of Twitter and other social media, and Trump’s statements as president through the use of textiles that embody warmth, craft, permanence, civility, and a shared history. The daintiness and integrity of each piece stand in stark contrast to his presidency. 

Weymar has worked on projects with Build Peace (in Nicosia, Bogota, Zurich, and Belfast), the Nantucket Atheneum, the W.E.B. Du Bois Center at UMass Amherst, the University of Puget Sound, The Zen Hospice Project (San Francisco), the Peddie School, Open Arts Space (Damascus, Syria), Trans Tipping Point Project (Victoria, BC), New York Textile Month, Textile Arts Center (Brooklyn, NY), The Wing (NYC and SF), and Alison Cornyn’s Incorrigibles project, as well as Syrian journalist and activist Mansour Omari. Her work has been exhibited and collected in the United States and Canada.  Visit Weymar’s on Instagram (@dianaweymar).

The Arts Council of Princeton, founded in 1967, fulfills its mission of Building Community through the Arts by presenting a wide range of programs including community arts outreach, exhibitions, performances, free community cultural events, and studio-based classes and workshops in a wide range of media. Housed in the landmark Paul Robeson Center for the Arts, Arts Council of Princeton programs are designed to be high-quality, engaging, affordable and accessible for the diverse population of the greater Princeton region.

Photo by Yvonne Tnt