Faith Ringgold is an American painter, mixed media sculptor, performance artist, writer, teacher and lecturer. Ringgold’s first story quilt Who’s Afraid of Aunt Jemima? was written in 1983 as a way of publishing her unedited words (About Faith, n.d.). It is a quilt work made with acrylic paint and consists of 56 square panels bordered by patterned fabric (Glenstone, n.d.). The work holds a recurring theme in Ringgold's work: concerns about women’s issues in our society. Critic Benjamin Genocchio described the work in The New York Times as “visually beautiful” and “filled with moments of wry or bitter comedy” (2009). Ringgold said her work is a “discipline which is communicated out of experience,” adding that “[she] feels that speaking up for ideas can improve the lives of people and is a way to make change” (Cahan & Kocur, 1996, p. 146). Ringgold said she feels that artists have power in having their work looked at, understood, and made available to people over a long period of time which is important to “give us the feeling we need” (Cahan & Kocur, 1996, p. 146). I admire Ringgold’s ability to visually communicate her thoughts and concerns that she has been carrying as an African American woman artist. Ringgold speaks her mind in her own way while displaying the life of herself and her connected communities. I was inspired to learn how personal storytelling transfers meaningful experiences and builds connections between the viewer and the artist. A writer, Zoë Lescaze said “Art does not just reflect the world – it engages with it” in the article, 13 Artists On: Immigration (2018). In the same article, Baeza said the way contemporary art approaches ideas of art is “transforming, redefining and reimagining” (2018). Their description of art was very different from the art my students learned in weekly classes. I focused on implementing those new findings into my new art teaching.