Celebrate the opening of the exhibition "Crown & Stage: The Monarchy and Shakespeare in Quilts" during First Fridays at the International Quilt Museum!

Co-Curated by Dr. Carole Levin, Willa Cather Emerita Professor of History at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, "Crown & Stage" explores how quilts and other forms of material culture traveled beyond the playhouse and palace. This exhibition features quilts honoring British queens, Shakespeare’s words stitched in fabric, and contemporary objects that reinterpret these icons.

At 5:30 p.m., join us in the IQM Reception Hall for a special reading of "Creatively Expanding the Premodern." Written by Levin, Marguerite A. Tassi, Christine Stewart-Nuñez, and Julia Griffin, this book highlights the stories of women from premodern history and literature through poems, plays, and essays. The authors will also be available for a book signing following the reading. 

Remember First Fridays are always free. These events are held on the first Friday of each month from 4-7 p.m. 

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About the authors: 

Carole Levin is Willa Cather Professor of History Emerita at the University of Nebraska. She is the author or editor of twenty books, most recently The Reign and Life of Queen Elizabeth I: Politics, Culture, and Society (2022) and the play Elizabeth I: In Her Own Words. She has held fellowships at the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Newberry Library, and the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Warwick.

Marguerite A. Tassi is Professor of English at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. She is the author of The Scandal of Images: Iconoclasm, Eroticism, and Painting in Early Modern English Drama (2005) and Women and Revenge in Shakespeare: Gender, Genre, and Ethics (2012) and the editor of Poetry for Kids: William Shakespeare (2018).

Christine Stewart-Nuñez is Professor of Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Manitoba. She is the author of Chrysopoeia: Essays of Language, Love, and Place (2022), The Poet & The Architect (2021), and four other books of poetry. She is also the co-editor of two books, including Scholars and Poets Talk About Queens (2015). From 2019 to 2021, she served as South Dakota’s poet laureate.

Julia Griffin was, until 2025, Professor in the English Department at Georgia Southern University, specializing in Renaissance English literature. In 2011, she published the first edition of the complete works of Anne Steele. She has also published poetry in a number of journals, including Classical Outlook, Light, and The Ekphrastic Review.