Jill Scott and Bisa Butler on Staying the Course

Jill Scott relishes a slow creative process, sometimes spending months or years on a single verse. After more than a decade without a new record, she has released To Whom This May Concern, her sixth album, a project she hopes will ignite a personal revolution in listeners.

Now based in Tennessee, Scott emerged in the late 1990s as a spoken-word poet in Philadelphia, co-wrote the Roots' 1999 single You Got Me and followed with the debut album Who Is Jill Scott? Words and Sounds Vol. 1, which includes A Long Walk. She has also published The Moments, the Minutes, the Hours and acted in film and television, including The No.

1 Ladies’ Detective Agency. Bisa Butler’s practice is likewise labor intensive. She reinterprets archival and family photographs as intricate quilted portraits, sourcing vibrant fabrics from market stalls in Ghana and South Africa and from manufacturers in the Netherlands.

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