Happy Sunday Loves!!
I’m in an art exhibit that opens this Thursday 2/20 6p - 8p, if you are in the Harlem area, please feel free to stop by and say 👋🏿- it’s on the gorgeous City College campus in their archive library’s art gallery, how perfectly poetically appropriate 😉📚 -
THE OTHER UTOPIAS will be up until 3/5!!
(It’s on the 5th floor of the library and there are stairs and elevator for those in need)
Amazing busy weekend. Sunday was a gorgeous day!!
Thank you so much to Joseph Cuillier and Shani Peters of the Black School for inviting me to be a part of their special project Black Love Fest. I felt so much love and support from folks, it was almost surreal. Gave some books away and sold some cards and buttons too!!
Some pics 😍😍😍😍
Hope to see you at the next meet up!!
If I had a time machine I would definitely take a ride back to the days of the Harlem Renaissance to have a conversation with Black librarian Regina Anderson, the first Black person to head an NYPL branch.
She was good friends with multiple Black icons of that time period, including writers like Zora Neale Hurston, who slept on her couch often when she was in NYC, and Langston Hughes, they hung out for days at a time and made meals together.
A playwright, performer and avid reader - she saw books as a means of promoting intercultural understanding.
She rose through the ranks from clerk to head her own branch and was creator/coordinator of public programming, meet ups, parties, classes, workshops, book talks, political meetings, performances and other events that engaged the community around Blackness and womanhood.
Many of them happened at the 135th branch which is now known as The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. She devoted her life to books and reading, and saw the library as a tool for change/resistance. She sounds like my kind of people. #archives #blacklibrary #blacklibrarian #socialart #publicpractice #harlemrenaissance #blackhistory #timetravel #muse #kindredspirit #freeblackwoman #freeblackwomenslibrary
hi, have many books by black females that I will gratefully give to your library. will u be in harlem 2017-18. thank u
Hi, yes I will be in harlem in 2018, I am working on securing locations and dates and will post the information here, once it’s confirmed. Thank you!!
Toni Morrison 💕
Maya Angelou 💕
Zadie Smith 💕
Zora Neale Hurston 💕
Alice Walker 💕
Beautiful assortment of Black iconic writers picked up by the gorgeous @mallit313 last week at The Free Black Women’s Library!! So so good!!! 🙌🏾📚👌🏾☺️
More sweet moments of book swap bliss from last Sunday’s session. Such an awesome array of beautiful bookworms 💕📚☺️😍
The last Free Black Women’s Library session was so beautiful it felt epic!!
So many wonderful people came through, over a hundred books were traded and it was so busy I wasn’t able to get photos of every trade and/or beautiful moment, this amazing turnout in addition to the beautiful story telling workshop made it a very special day. Great exploration of “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston and “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid.
also got some great footage and interviews for the TFBWL documentary.
Thank you so much to everyone that came out!! Stay tuned for details on the next happening next month in Bedstuy.
Special shout out of love and gratitude to Anais,Taylor and Rachel of the Studio Museum for all the amazing support
Reading Sweat by Zora Neale Hurston at The Studio Museum in Harlem. Thank you so much to them for having me. Today was amazing!!
So I’m really really excited for the next Free Black Women’s Library session happening at Studio Museum in Harlem today. This is a traveling biblio-installation of books written by Black women that I started collecting in 2015 and now have 850 books total.
All are welcome to stop by to check out and enjoy the collection as well as trade books with the library.
Please remember to bring only books written by Black women for trading.
Know that you do not need to bring books to attend or enjoy 😊
The library will be open from noon to 5 and I’m leading a short story telling session/workshop at 2.
I will be reading “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid and “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston ✨✨
There is also some gorgeous art currently in the museum so I highly recommend checking out their current exhibits as well, all in all it’s going to be a pretty awesome day, so come through!!