Janae N. Williams

Photo credit: Amanda Greene

“Despite our warped and often made-to-be-mysterious relationship to production brought to us by capitalism, creating doesn't just happen, it is not innate, nor linear and often not succinct. As one who has been working on a project that has taken me five years to really wrap my head around, daily, I come into understanding more deeply the time and space required to truly be immersed in ones craft enough to birth it. This reality is regularly juxtaposed with the dearth of these opportunities to take time creating, thinking, experimenting and playing in the ways that ALL creating (scientific, culinary, dance, theatre, comedy, etc.) require in the lives of black queer and trans folks with disabilities who are poor. My time, space and rich solitude at Hambidge simply affirmed what I already knew to be true in a different context. Black folks need more time, more spaciousness for and access to play to plant the seeds of our creating.”

— Janae N. Williams, North Carolina, Paper-making, Nellie Mae Rowe Fellow