Wafa Ghnaim—Tatreez Resistance: Traditional Art of Palestinian Embroidery

Wafa Ghnaim, curator for the Museum of the Palestinian People in Washington, D.C. and Senior Research Fellow for The Metropolitan Museum of Art in the Ancient Near East, intertwines memory, history, politics and embroidery in sharing traditional Palestinian patterns and stories passed on to her by her mother.

This talk is in conjunction with the student-curated exhibition in the Flatiron Project Space, Land of the Olive Groves, January 9-January 25, 2025.

Wafa Ghnaim is a Palestinian dress historian, researcher, author, curator, educator and embroideress. Her first book, Tatreez & Tea: Embroidery and Storytelling in the Palestinian Diaspora (2018), documents the traditional patterns and stories passed on to her by her mother, award-winning artist Feryal Abbasi-Ghnaim. Her curatorial debut TATREEZ INHERITANCE (2023) at the Museum of the Palestinian People in Washington, D.C. showcased traditional Palestinian dresses circulating North America through “Holy Land” travels during the early and mid-twentieth century, and the importance of reclaiming these dresses by Palestinians in the diaspora. She released her second publication THOBNA (2023) to celebrate Palestinian embroidery as a powerful form of resistance over the past century. Ghnaim is currently the Curator for the Museum of the Palestinian People, Founder of The Tatreez Institute, and Senior Interdisciplinary Research Fellow for The Metropolitan Museum of Art in the Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art.

Host or Publisher Art History, Visual & Critical Studies, Honors