Experiencing Interruptions?

Stitch, Breathe, Speak: The George Floyd Quilts

After witnessing George Floyd's death on cellphone video, people from a New Hampshire church want to take action. With the support of their pastor they create an artistic project to stitch the final words of George Floyd into quilts, and the community comes together to "bless" the quilts and send them out into the world.

  • Chris Owen
    Director
    Atwood (documentary film, 2014)
  • Chris Owen
    Writer
  • Jan Sutcliffe
    Writer
  • Chris Owen
    Producer
  • Jan Sutcliffe
    Producer
  • Mark Koyama
    Key Cast
    "himself"
  • Harriet Ward
    Key Cast
    "herself"
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Short
  • Runtime:
    17 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    August 3, 2021
  • Production Budget:
    20,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16x9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Chris Owen

Chris is most alive making things with other people: films, podcasts, music, a good conversation. A lover of words and bodies, spirit and matter, Chris is drawn to this potent intersection of the timeless with time, where human life—in depth and fullness—happens.

An Ohio boy now rooted in New Hampshire, Chris is grateful for this broken yet beautiful world: for art, for creativity, for kindness—and for the power at the heart of all things, that can bring new life from dead ends.

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Director Statement

The quilts are the art; Mr. Floyd's words are the spirit. The aim of the film is simply to bear witness, with humility.

In conversation with the quilters, I invited them back into their artistic process, back into that interior space where they were paying deep attention, in their stitching, to the anguished words of a man being killed. Through the quilters and the quilts, my hope is that the film helps us to continue to pay attention to those words, and that good may come from that attentiveness, in ways beyond our knowing.