Interview with Author, Kyra E. Hicks of Black Threads Blog

Kyra E. Hicks was mesmerized after seeing Eva Ungar Grudin’s 1990 traveling exhibition, “Stitching Memories: African-American Story Quilts,” that she began to learn their stories—and to teach herself to create her own quilts. “I found my voice that afternoon in the museum,” she remembers. This was the beginning of a journey that led Kyra not only to learn quilting, but also to write her books, 1.6 Million African American Quilters: Survey, Sites, and a Half-Dozen Art Quilt Blocks (Black Threads Press, 2010), This I Accomplish: Harriet Powers' Bible Quilt and Other Pieces (Black Threads Press, 2009), Martha Ann's Quilt for Queen Victoria (Brown Books Publishing, 2007, based on a true story) and Black Threads: An African American Quilting Sourcebook (McFarland & Co., 2003). She co-wrote Liberia: A Visit Through Books with Izetta Roberts Cooper (2008).