Punch Needle Embroidered Tapestry

Explore how to use a punch needle as an embroidery tool in this versatile, meditative tapestry technique. Learn the ropes by creating a small embroidered piece on a hoop with the option to contribute your work to a collective tapestry with classmates. Prepare your own, larger work surface on canvas stretcher bars, then use your new knowledge to create a 16 by 20-inch tapestry in a design of your choosing. All levels welcome. $

$81-$130

Tabitha Arnold makes labor-intensive art. Born and based in Chattanooga, she studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, then began to make tapestries using a rug-making tool as a makeshift embroidery needle. As a socialist and labor organizer, her work reflects coming of age during a new wave of unionization in the United States. Arnold’s tapestries borrow imagery from Bible Belt spirituality, social-realist public art movements, and ancient art motifs to create new historical artifacts from a working-class perspective. Her pieces interweave contemporary events with images of historical class struggle, with a special focus on the lesser-known history of labor organizing in the South. Arnold’s work has been profiled in Jacobin, Hyperallergic, and Burnaway, and featured on print covers for Dissent Magazine since 2021. She has held solo exhibitions at the Worker's Art and Heritage Center in Hamilton, ON, and Swarthmore College in Philadelphia. Her work h