The Folklife Center at Crandall Public Library is excited to announce the return of its popular Folklife After Hours Series with Tisha Dolton, Suffrage Singer Presents Songs Celebrating 100 Years of Votes for Women on Monday, March 29, 2021 at 6:30 PM EDT via Zoom.

Tisha Dolton presents a concert of songs relating to the Women's Suffrage Movement to compliment the exhibition, Equali-tea: Suffragist Tea Cozies in Redwork, A Suffrage Centennial Exhibition. This concert was filmed and edited by librarian Kevin Rogan, and will be presented as a watch party followed by a Q&A with the singer. Please register through the events calendar at CrandallLibrary.org.

Dolton is a singer, historian, librarian, and embroiderer whose research focus lies in the music, art, craft, and theater of the women's suffrage movement. She also uses local newspapers to unearth forgotten suffragists in Warren, Washington, and Saratoga counties. In 2020 she received an Individual Artist Grant from the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council to create 42 embroidered portraits of New York State suffragists and provide community programming to compliment the exhibition currently online at CrandallLibrary.org.

Equali-tea: Suffragist Tea Cozies in Redwork is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency Decentralization Program with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature; administered by the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council (LARAC).

This and other concerts can be viewed on The Folklife Center at Crandall Public Library’s YouTube channel, 

Crandall Public Library is located in downtown Glens Falls, NY. Pop-In Library services are available Tuesday 10am-6pm and Friday 10am-4pm. Curbside Pick-Up is available by appointment on Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday. The Folklife Center is currently closed to visitors. Please call 518-792-6508 x239 with research inquiries.

The suffrage tea cozies are currently on display with only library staff able to see them. Luckily, I had some help from my fellow librarian, Kevin Rogan, and we got all 42 tea cozies with corresponding suffragist biographies online. See the online exhibit at crandalllibrary.org. 

EQUALI-TEA: SUFFRAGIST TEA COZIES IN REDWORK... What does that mean? What is this about? Well, I am about to tell you. Over the course of the coming weeks, I will be blogging about this project of mine. Explaining the idea, the purpose, the funding, the construction, the exhibition, and, yes, the EMBROIDERY! So grab your favorite tea, or other beverage of choice, while I let you into my world.

To spare you from too much back story, let's just say I always wanted to be a singer, so when that didn't work out I was kind of at a loss. I switched my major to history, & figured out ways to add my singing & interest in women's history into ALL of my history jobs. I even taught myself to embroider while wait for tours to start. Eventually I brought my love of music & women's history into my embroidery, creating portraits of favorite musicians, and historical figures, especially suffragists. Then in 2017-ish I heard about a call for art HerFlag2020 from artist Marilyn Artus & applied. It was a long shot, very long. Crazy talented, professional artists were applying. I lost out to the amazingly talented Indira Cessarine. 

Since I had put so much thought into this idea, I thought I would adjust it & just do it anyway, but maybe on a smaller scale. Enter my local arts council, LARAC, of which I have been a member for a few years. They gave me my first ever show as an artist, a four person show in the local gallery. (There are a series of posts on my other blog if you are interested.) A friend/colleague of mine had just finished her own grant project & I was inspired. (You can visit her over at The Victorian Archivist over on Wordpress.) 

I was fairly confident in my application, unlike the HerFlag application BUT, I was still surprised & so excited to be chosen for a 2020 Individual Artist Grant funded by the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency Decentralization Program with the support Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature; administered by the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council. Thank you NYSCA!

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I am essentially creating 40 tea cozies, each hand embroidered with a portrait of a New York State suffragist, with an emphasis on Upstate NY. I also wanted to include as many women of color as I could find reference portraits for. Some of these women are national figures we are familiar with in 2020. ​But many were active in state, regional & local suffrage clubs, and we never learned their names. This project means to bring some of those women out of the shadows, & into the light.

More to come. Follow me on Instagram (@aprilsongstress) or Facebook for additional updates & images.