The Black and White Together Project was launched during International Beading Week last year (2020) with the aim being to collect, from makers around the world, numerous black and white warped squares, using size 11 black and white Delicas. These will then be assembled into one connected piece. The B&WT Project Team is happy to share that this project has taken our efforts to engage the beading community to a new and exciting level, thank you IBW organizers!

Our team, led by Professor Sam Norgard, Guest Ambassador to the 2020 IBW, has worked together locally to ‘bead with a purpose’. This project takes this work internationally – If you are reading this, you may be one of the contributors to this project! THANK YOU! Our Team hoped to engage a diverse community of beaders. Although The B&WT Project has engaged over 250 beaders from 12 countries we can only hope that diversity is represented by these participants.

The Black & White Together Project will incorporate over 3000 components from Makers around the world. You may be asking, “Well, what’s the purpose of this piece?” Our answer is that it seeks to connect us, to build a community that is inclusive, and it is very much what we need in our world today. You may be asking, “What’s next?” “When do we see the final piece?” Some of you may know what the piece will be – for others this will be the reveal! Our intent is to honor the remarkable African American bead artist, Joyce Scott, who has pioneered the use of the body as a format to tell the story of the African American experience. Since this is an on-going process, we invite you to join us on this journey by visiting the B&WTP Facebook page which will be updated to show our progress. Thank you for being a part of this effort, for taking your time to contribute to this work!