Weaving Culture

Weaving Culture is a mural by artist James Dunn. This is a ‘wall weaving’ representing the South Philly Southwark community. Vertical warp threads serve as the foundation much like the Southwark School teachers and staff, who help create a basis for the environs. Weft is created by intertwining thread through warp in repetitive patterns to create intricate designs. The horizontal weft threads here act as the interconnecting of individual lives coming together to create a larger piece or neighborhood. Each person brings with his/her own unique life and cultural experiences that are interwoven in Southwark.

A variety of weaving techniques are highlighted throughout the different sections on this mural. Students drew symbols from patterns found in the neighborhood cultures and categorized them within the weft threads, based on similarities found. Some weft threads were left loose to symbolize a continuation of the neighborhood story being woven together. Students also created a series of mini-murals that were installed on the lower brick areas around the base of the school.

Weaving Culture is part of a two-year-long process at Southwark School. The front schoolyard has been transformed into a colorful, intergenerational space—one of the few large, open spaces in South Philadelphia, it makes a statement about collective ownership of public space in the face of rapid urban development. Community members worked with artist collective Basurama to build outdoor seating and planters from repurposed school desks. Dunn also created a series of mini-murals inspired by conversations about weaving together the neighborhood’s diverse cultures.