About this episode
MEET SHEREEN, A TEXTILE ARTIST BASED IN AMMAN WITH A PASSION FOR ALL THINGS HANDMADE AND WHAT SHE CALLS A WORLD OF ORGANIZED CHAOS (@shereen.quttaineh). Palestinian from Jerusalem and Jordanian as well, she was born in Kuwait and left with her family during the Gulf War, eventually settling in Jordan.
Trained originally in painting and a longtime art teacher, she came back to tatreez about a decade ago, but never quite as a traditionalist: her approach blends structured cross-stitch with a much more intuitive, sketch-like embroidery style, mixing printmaking, paper, and fabric into work that resists the grid entirely.
In this episode, Shereen talks about her Forbidden Plants of Palestine project: a set of original motifs designed around plants Palestinians have been restricted from foraging or cultivating, sparked by research into foraging bans and the labor and pain of the ongoing genocide in Gaza. What started as a free PDF she shared on Instagram turned into a sprawling, unplanned collaboration: the motifs have been translated into languages including French, Italian, German, Japanese, Korean, and multiple Spanish dialects, and picked up by tattoo artists, embroidery circles, and exhibitions from Mexico to Spain, where a group reinterpreted the designs through their own "Bordado Serrano" tradition.
She also talks about her upcycled "wearable art" line, which she runs with her sister out of her Amman studio, and the intuitive-stitching and textile-collage sessions she teaches there.
You can learn more about her workshops in Amman, see her work, or get in touch via her artist IG, her wearable art line IG, her traveling tapestry IG, and website.
You’ll hear about:
>> 1:31: Shereen’s connection to Palestine
>> 3:30: Her tatreez journey, including non-Palestinian embroidery
>> 9:20: Forbidden Plants of Palestine project
>> 15:21: Researching Palestinian plants
>> 18:47: Reception & things that came out of the project
>> 25:38: Shereen’s wearable art line and workshops
>> 31:15: Advice for freehand embroidery
>> 33:17: The Traveling Tapestry project
>> 38:30: What’s next for Shereen
>> 42:00: Major life lessons from tatreez
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Links Mentioned
>> Watch the film Foragers (2022)
>> Read The Land in Our Bones by Layla K. Feghali
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Links mentioned