The Sunflower Quilting Bee at Arles

This lithograph is related to Faith Ringgold’s “French Collection” story-quilt series, which illustrates the travels of Willia Marie Simone, a fictional young artist who goes to Paris and meets a host of iconic male European artists. Here, Simone appears at the bottom left of the print. She is accompanied by eight influential African American women: Madame C. J. Walker (1867–1919), Sojourner Truth (ca. 1797–1883), Ida Wells (1862–1931), Fannie Lou Hamer (1917–1977), Harriet Tubman (ca. 1820–1913), Rosa Parks (1913–2005), Mary McLeod Bethune (1875–1955), and Ella Baker (1905–1986). These women are sewing a giant sunflower quilt, a traditional African American art form. Conspicuously separated from the group of women is the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh. This print functions as a commentary on history’s celebration of white men’s achievements over those of African American women. The Sunflower Quilting Bee at Arles emphasizes the important contributions women made to the visual arts as they sew in the sunflower field, ironically the very subject of many of Van Gogh’s esteemed paintings.