Quick Take
A group of like-minded ladies in a quilting guild found new purpose for their sewing skills. Calling themselves the "Pop Tarts," they pour their crafting into protesting the Trump administration on Santa Cruz County highway overpasses and at larger gatherings.
For one group of neighbors in Santa Cruz County, their vision for democracy is sewn together in the form of quilts. They call themselves the Pop Tarts.
“Old angry women are tarts, and we do pop-up protests,” said Cate Munch, co-founder of the Pop Tarts. Before the group’s inception, she hadn’t protested since she was a teenager during the Vietnam War. “What’s happening now is too big to keep following along in a traditional way,” she said.
The Pop Tarts make appearances at least three times a week at overpasses and intersections around the county, in addition to attending larger anti-Trump administration protests such as “No Kings.” On Saturday, they held a demonstration of around 13 people in Aptos on the Rio Del Mar Boulevard overpass over Highway 1, with their fabric signs and hand-sewn placards sending messages in bold.
Members held up a colorful array of personalized quilts toward the traffic on Rio Del Mar Boulevard, to which cars honked in solidarity. Most of the quilts on display were made during a workshop taught by Munch, who has been a quilter for over 50 years, at the Pajaro Valley Quilt Association. Last month, the guild hosted a “Cate Munch/POPS” special exhibit within its annual show, featuring Munch’s quilt-art pieces and 23 of the Pop Tarts’ protest signs.
What started last year as five women who wanted to demonstrate frequently against the actions of the Trump administration quickly grew to include 50 people of all ages and genders using quilting as a medium of protest.
“We’re forming a community for what may come, because things are going to get a lot worse. What we’re doing now is not keeping silent, not keeping a message under a bed,” said Munch. “We’re exercising the rights we have, whether or not we’re in danger for doing that.”
Ruth Smith, another Pop Tart, said quilting allows her art and her activism to intersect.
“It’s an expression of who I am. It’s the deepest part of me,” she said. “I have creative impulses and I want to be an active participant in democracy, so it’s a blend of the two things that are important to me.”
For Debbie Johnson, a local fiber artist who discovered the Pop Tarts at their demonstration on John Lewis Day last July, quilting was a way for her to get a message across with clarity and precision.
“These are just my feelings,” said Johnson, pointing to her quilt that read “heartbroken” in heavy black lettering. “I made this one in July. I am heartbroken at what is becoming of our country, it’s just terrible.”
Despite her serious reasons for protest, Johnson looks forward to getting together with the Pop Tarts at their weekly demonstrations.
“It’s close to home, and I just love these women … it’s always a highlight of my week,” she said.
Just as generations of quilters expressed themselves through patterns and repurposed fabric, the Pop Tarts are repurposing their hobbies and their art to express themselves in political protest.
Quilts are both aesthetically pleasing and infinitely reusable, said Pop Tarts member Jackie Tuttle.
On a national scale, activism is taking many shapes. Munch said the Pop Tarts want to show up for people who are unable to protest, or who might feel alone in the current political moment.
“We each show up in what we love and we each show up in what we have to give,” said Munch, who will be holding future workshops at the guild for quilting novices and local artists.
For more information about the Pop Tarts or upcoming workshops, contact Cate Munch at cm@catherinemunch.com.
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