Since its founding in 2010, Refugee Artisans of Worcester (RAW) has had a robust public presence in Massachusetts. Below we mention some of the exhibitions, craft fairs, community events, and collaborations with schools, colleges and universities that RAW has led or participated in. Beyond empowering the refugee artisans economically and encouraging them to take pride in making their heritage arts, these events and collaborations have always been directed toward a general public, to help the artisans’ neighbors see them as highly accomplished craft makers and contributors to local art scenes.
Gallery Exhibitions and Public Installations
Since 2010 RAW has organized numerous large and small exhibitions. These have included: “Crafting a New Home: Refugee Artisans of Worcester,” Krikorian Gallery at Worcester Center for Crafts (January-February 2020), “Reaching across the World through Heritage Crafts,” 2022, at Lexington Arts and Crafts Society, Lexington MA.; and “Celebrating Community: RAW Crafts from Bangladesh, Guatemala, Iraq,” 2022 at Remillard Gallery, UMASS Memorial Hospital. The 2020 exhibition was guest curated by Rodgers, Ferrante and Kariko, with wall texts, gallery tours, college student docents, and curators’ talks. The other two events were curated by Ferrante and Kariko, the case with all the following as well.
RAW artisans were participants in the following: a Worcester PopUp (JMAC) in 2019, “Unwoven Journeys: Healing Fibers, Sisters in Stitches Joined by the Cloth and RAW”; “Students and Refugee Artists Together: A Celebration of Indigenous Crafts and Social Business” at the Jacob Knight Memorial Art Gallery at the former Becker College, Leicester MA campus. The artisans’ works were also displayed in Holden, MA., at the Gale Public Library, “Art at the Gale,” 2023. In 2021 a selection of the artisans’ crafts were part of a permanent installation entitled “Nepali and Vietnamese Heritage” at the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center.
Craft Fairs
These events present a broad selection of RAW crafts for sale and often include several of the artisans making their crafts on site. These fairs include the following: sTART on the Street (annual arts festival on Park Avenue, Worcester); New England Weavers Conference at Worcester State U; Pioneer Valley Weavers Guild; Weavers Guild of Boston; Sabbath Day Lake Shaker Village, Maine (gift shop); UMASS Medical School International Festival; and Shrewsbury MA International Fair and Diversity Celebration. RAW artisans also presented a display of crafts for International Refugee Day at Trinity Lutheran Church in Worcester and at several Holiday Craft Fairs at First Baptist Church, Worcester. Other craft fairs were held for YWCA, Worcester, International Women’s Day and on Family Weekend, Holy Cross. Additional RAW craft fairs were held at the Berlin MA Arts and Fine Craft Fair, the Bedford MA Multicultural Fair, and the well-known Lowell MA Folk Festival. They have also displayed their works at the New England Botanic Garden, at meetings of the Jesuit Universities Humanitarian Action Network at Holy Cross, at ACE or African Community Education Gala, and at the Abbey Kelly Foster Celebration, also in Worcester. This is only a partial list --RAW craft fairs are becoming ubiquitous in Central Massachusetts.
School and College Collaborations
Ferrante and Kariko have presented talks about RAW at many area high schools including South Community High School, Notre Dame Academy, and Worcester Academy. They have also done presentations at New Citizens Center for Young Adults. Collaborations with local colleges and universities (student research projects, website development) have included ones with Assumption U, the former Becker College, Boston U, Clark U, Holy Cross, Harvard School of Design, Mt. Wachusett Community College, WPI and Worcester State U. Beyond Massachusetts RAW has also collaborated with Goucher College in Maryland, Dartmouth, and the University of Waterloo. Other community collaborations have involved Worcester Art Museum, Worcester Public Library, and the Worcester Women’s Oral History Project.