Student Exhibition: A Common Thread: Cathardic Healing Through Textile Art

Aprillera is a Spanish word that translates to the English “burlap.” Literally referring to discardable or unwanted fabric, this word is also the name of a genre of folk art that was created by women living under the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile (1973-1989). Given the extreme censorship and repression of expression, Chilean women began sewing seemingly cotidian scenes of their daily life made of scraps of fabric, or arpilleras. These simple tapestries depicted activities like soup kitchens and childcare, but they also included more serious topics such as images of forced disappearance and torture of their loved ones. 

Meeting in homes and churches, these Chilean women created spaces to share information and process the collective grief and rage that they experienced under repression. These arpilleras were then smuggled out of the country by religious leaders and human rights activists and brought to countries like Canada, where they were able to tell the truth about the human rights abuses that were censored by the Pinochet regime. The tradition and practice of crafting arpilleras has continued in Chile and been taken up by environmental activists, feminist activists, and others working for social justice and collective catharsis through art.

These arpilleras were made by students in SPAN: 370 Illness and Literature in Latin America, Spring 2026. Students selected a social issue that they identified as harmful to human wellbeing and health. Issues that they chose to depict were wide-ranging and touched on human suffering and healing. The topics that you see depicted include: migrant detention facilities and family separation, the experience of being a woman in the world and the pressure to “have it all,” the conflict in Sudan, and the global refugee crisis. Other aprilleras depict images of catharsis and beauty: a lotus flower, the summer sky, and the experience of learning together.

The materials to create these arpilleras were gathered from the Texas Art Asylum, a repository for repurposing discarded materials. The beauty of the arpillera exists not in theindividual skill or technique of the arpillerista, but in the collective process of stitching unwanted pieces together to create something new and meaningful. 

This display was co-curated by Dr. Claire Branigan, Lecturer in Spanish and Latin American Studies, and K. Sarah Ostrach, Art & Architecture Librarian, Summer 2026. Questions or comments can be directed to ostrach@rice.edu.