Karen Henderson

www.karenhendersonfiber.com

When I create my art, I try to tap into the calm center of myself and let myself respond to my environment and the materials I work with.  I love the rhythm of weaving and stitching. Creating my own cloth feels right, and the challenge of re-creating moments in nature is endlessly fascinating for me.  I take time to absorb each piece that I make in all of its stages, until it is complete. 

My work is shown in group or solo shows, and I also create special pieces on commission for individuals, businesses, or through art consultants.  My process for commissions is personal and rewarding for me both me and my clients.  I enjoy learning what it is that people respond to in my work, and what they are looking for in their home or business.  Please visit my links to see more of my artwork, process and inspiration, and feel free to contact me for Exhibit, Commission, or Lecture opportunities.

The other creative hat I wear is as a Freelance Textile / Surface Pattern Designer, working with clients in the Home Furnishings, Fashion and Stationery/Giftware industries.  With this aspect of my work, I create designs using the fiber techniques I love, and incorporate many other art techniques as well.  I also create computer generated designs in Photoshop and Illustrator, and/or my designs are a combination of both hand and computer work.  While this design work is not included on my art website currently,  I'm happy to send design samples upon request, and encourage you to contact me if you have a project in mind.

I’m also working on getting an Etsy site together for the wearable art and other smaller hand crafted items that I enjoy making.  Once I have that shop up, I'll let you know!

Artist statement:  In my work, I am interested in the connections between self, place, emotion and time.  Seasons, atmospheres and the time of day intrigue me.  I try to recreate these natural occurrences, evoking emotions that I associate with them through the use of color, line, and texture.

I use different dye techniques (batik, shibori, color removal, rust print) as well as sewing with my weavings and fabric pieces.  I draw lines by stitching with thread.  Dimension is added with tucks, layers, or other manipulations of fabric.  The lines suggest landscape or other aspects of nature.  Most of the techniques I choose to use are very contemplative, encouraging introspection; other processes are spontaneous and unpredictable.  I try to find a balance between the two approaches, trying to capture those ephemeral, fleeting moments of time.

Short Bio:
Originally from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Karen Henderson now resides in the beautiful Green Mountain state of Vermont.  She learned weaving and print design in the textile design program at Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, PA.   Her work has been shown in high-end craft shows and exhibits, and is found in many private and corporate collections.  Her work has been published in entitled “1000 Artisan Textiles” , ""The Guild Sourcebook of Residential Art #6"", and in Fiberarts, Surface Design Journal, and Selvedge magazines.  Recently, some of her work was used on the set of the award winning movie “Black Swan”.  

Location:  Montpelier, Vermont, USA 

Blog:  SDA Vermont

Memberships:

   InLiquid Artist Member
   I volunteer as the Vermont area Rep for Surface Design Association 
   Textile Study Group of New York

Languages spoken:  English

Hand woven textile by Karen Henderson

Tags:  fine art, landscape, stitching, tapestry wall pieces, weaving, commissions, textile, fiber,  textile design, surface pattern design

Lotta Helleberg

www.lottahelleberg.com

I am a Swedish born textile artist with a background in graphic design and print making. I work primarily with linen utilizing a technique in which leaves and other plant material are coated with paint and pressed onto fabric. I am also exploring natural dyes and eco-printing, where the plants themselves release color pigments which bond with the fabric. The resulting impressions are incorporated into quilts, fabric collages, and a variety of functional and decorative objects, such as pillows, table linens, and purses.

The beauty of nature is a constant inspiration and a common theme in my work. I am also committed to environmentally sound production methods, including the use of water based, non-toxic inks and dyes, and natural, or reclaimed fabric. All my pieces are created by hand in my Charlottesville, Virginia, studio.  My work can also be found at The Barn Swallow in Ivy, Virginia.

Artist's Statement:  I am in awe of the natural world and the beauty it produces. I try to reflect a sense of that amazement in my art, by using and replicating imagery from nature in my dyes and prints. I also cherish the slow process involving dyeing, printing, and stitching by hand. Ultimately I believe that the objects we surround ourselves with should be both purposeful and beautiful. Something well made and delightful will bring joy into our everyday lives.

Location:  Charlottesville, Virginia, USA

Online shops:  Etsy, Big Cartel

Blog:  inleaf

Memberships:  Fiber Transformed

Languages spoken:  English, Swedish

 "fallow fields no 1" by Lotta Helleberg

leaf printed plant dyed linen, machine stitched

reclaimed oak frame, 15" x 15"

  

Tags: leaf printing, eco printing, handmade, linen, art quilt, fiber collage, botanical, natural dyes, stitching, textile

 

Sunflower Design

www.sunflowerdesign.ca

Sunflower Design specializes in one-of-a-kind quilts and fibre art, whimsical patterns and colourful sun prints. Each item is originally designed and features quality workmanship. 

Artist's Statement:  My name is Marcy Horswill. I have been an artist almost all of my life, but I did not accept this until I turned the magical age of 40. Looking back, I realize the life path I follow has woven in and out of a variety of artistic interests from painting silk scarves to corporate graphic design. Every way I turn I find a new creative path to embark on.

I am an avid collector. I have jars of buttons, beads, ribbons, feathers, shells, etc., which I treasure and draw inspiration from. I also collect miniature teapots, regular teapots, blue china, giraffes, bird nests and Santa Claus figurines. Of course, my largest collection is comprised of quilting fabric, predominantly Bali cottons. I love their brilliant colour, high thread count and varying texture.

My favourite and most familiar pastime is quilting. Quilting is a broad term encompassing everything from traditional to innovative methods and designs. I started as a traditional quilter, but once I mastered the basic skills, I began designing my own art quilts and never looked back. My latest passion is beading, incorporating feathers, fibres and other three dimensional finds into my work and creating texture by soldering fabric and fibres.

I have a small studio where I work my creations. It is cozy and everything is at my fingertips. During a project, my studio becomes a whirlwind of fabric and other paraphernalia as one idea morphs into another. Part of the process before I start my next project is cleaning up the mess from the last one. It is an important step in my creativity. I spy bits and pieces from previous works, which remind me of things I want to try. Often the cleaning up sets the path for the next idea and I’m immersed again on another journey.

Why do I pursue creativity? When I turn to my studio, it is to escape the fast-paced and stressful world I live in. Time slows down when I walk through the studio door; in fact, time becomes irrelevant. As I familiarize myself with my space and collections, my life takes on a quiet rhythm. My senses become acutely aware of colour, texture and the quiet. Sketches go down on paper, needles go through fabric and layers form one on top of another. My heart beats to my own rhythm and a new idea is born.

Location: Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada

Online shops:  sunflowerquilts
   Time For Quilting

Blog: marcydesign

Memberships:

   Fibre Art Network
   Alberta Craft
   SAQA

Languages spoken:  English

Art Quilts by Sunflower Design

Tags:  artist, fibre, felt, felted wool, marcy horswill, fiber, creativity, design, hand dyed, art quilts

Wrapture by Inese

http://www.inesedesign.com/Home.html

I travel through different genres of art and design, depending on circumstances... I can easily adapt. People who know me and have seen my work recognize me through my colors and sense of whimsy. My textile design experience grew from working in fashion design. Glassblowing started as ceramics ended. A move to Europe drew me into interior design, but the economy gave me the opportunity to go back to knitwear, this time with all my years of textile design experience to back it up. I welcome new opportunities that give me a chance to use all the knowledge I have collected over the years. I love giving joy whether it is a new life to an old home or the perfect knit wrap that gives your eyes a sparkle and makes you look and feel beautiful.

I designed knitwear as a way of making a living after graduating from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Prodded on by a friend I bought a knitting machine and developed a mohair mobius strip shawl long enough to fit comfortably wrapped twice around the neck. At a craft fair a woman pulled one of the loops of the double wrap up over her head and asked ""is this how you wear it?"" My reaction was, how did you do that, show me, yes of course that's it, that's exactly it! I sold thousands of those wraps.

I moved to San Francisco, worked for others, then five years ago I moved to Riga, Latvia, my parents' homeland, and vowed to never have a full time job again. Freelance CAD textile design work was a joy until the economy crashed. I remembered my mobius wraps of 25 years back, reinvented them, adding width to make a stole, and colorful stripes to make them unrepeatable. 

Artist's statement:  I play with colors, these are my sketches. Each wrap is as unique as the individual who wears it. Distinct and unrepeatable.  If you visit Riga, I often participate in craft fairs in Old Town. My Facebook fan page has the latest updates.

Every day when I go to my knitting machine I have no idea what will happen, what colors will appear, what moods will be revealed. I just go with the flow...

Enjoy!

Location:  Riga, Latvia, Europe

Online shop:  WrapturebyInese

Languages spoken:  English, Latvian and enough German to find the train station and to sell a wrap

 Multi-functional Knitted Wraps by Inese

Tags:  knitwear, textiles, CAD, fashion design, color, textures, wraps, accessories, interiors, home textiles, one of a kind, ooak, hand loomed

Helen Klebesadel

http://www.klebesadel.com/

I am actually a painter and educator who paints and teaches about fiber arts along with all the other arts.  Most  recently I have begun actually designing fabrics myself, using my watercolor paintings as a base.

One series of watercolor paintings I have celebrates the quilts and crochet pieces that were the  under-recognized creative work  of the rural women in my family when I was 'coming up' in Wisconsin.  I especially love crazy quilts, and paint the quilts I wish I owned.

 I have an Etsy store for my paintings and prints (Niceharpy.Etsy.com)  as well as in the ArtfulHome.com virtual gallery, and I currently sell my fabrics on Spoonflower.com.  I'm delighted to have a small and growing following of quilters using my fabrics, which has a nice 'full-circle' feel to it for me.

My work is available at Grace Chosy Gallery in Madison, Wisconsin and I welcome visits by appointment at my studio, Helen Klebesadel Studio, also in Madison, Wisconsin.

Artist's Statement: "My visual concerns run the gamut from careful study to poetic, symbolic and sometimes political representations of nature and human nature.”

Helen Klebesadel is an artist, an educator, and an activist.  Born and raised in rural Wisconsin, her art has become the place where she explores how we learn our deepest values.   Klebesadel is best known for her environmental and women centered watercolors. She is particularly interested in how myths and stories socialize us to have different expectations for some people than from others.  She uses the creative process to re-examine and re-present narratives that resist and contest existing power structures by revealing they exist.  Klebesadel exhibits her work nationally and internationally.

Helen’s watercolors push the traditional boundaries of the medium in scale, content, and technique.   Her paintings range in size from the intimate to the monumental. She creates paintings that are transparent watercolors on paper, starting with detailed drawings and developing the images with layer upon layer of color washes and dry brush technique mixed with occasional areas of wet-into-wet spontaneity.  She paints until the paintings tell her she is done.  Most recently she has begun transforming her images into fabric designs and she is exploring the potential  of a merger of her imagery with fiber based works.

Helen Klebesadel earned her BS, a certificate in Women’s Studies, and a MFA in art from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  She has taught courses and workshops on creativity, studio art, and the contemporary women’s art movement for two decades.  Klebesadel continues to learn from her art experiences and her students.  Helen taught studio art at Lawrence University for ten years before leaving to become Director of the University of Wisconsin System’s Women’s Studies Consortium in 2000. She contributed a chapter entitled Re-Framing Studio Art Critique and Practice, to the recently published text ‘New Museum Theory and Practice: An Introduction.  Klebesadel’s art and prose have been published in Femspec, Frontiers, Feminist Studies, Interweave, and CALYX.  She is a past national president of the national Women’s Caucus for Art and a current Wisconsin Arts Board member.

"Prairie" Designer Fabric by Helen Klebesadel

Location:  Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Online Shops: 

   Niceharpy  (Etsy)
   klebesadel  (Artful Home)
   helenklebesadel  (Spoonflower)
   hklebesadel  (Zazzle)

Blog: klebesadel

Other Social Media:  Twitter 

Memberships:

   College Art Association
   Women's Caucus for Art
   National Women's Studies Association

Languages spoken: English

Watercolor Quilt Series

Sample Fabric Designs Available on Spoonflower

Tags: watercolor, quilts, spoonflower, feminist, women's studies, rural, crochet, painting, material culture

Linda Matthews

http://www.Linda-Matthews.com

I'm an Australian now living in Central Florida and I've been a textile artist in one form or another most of my life. After landing in the US in 2001 I quickly discovered and fell in love with art quilting. I then spent quite a number of years traveling throughout the US teaching creative sewing and art quilting classes and workshops, as well as exhibiting my art quilts.

These days though I prefer to stay close to home in Central Florida where I still teach locally from time to time and where I also self-publish a series of instructional dvds which are full of fabulous techniques specifically for textile and quilt artists. I also get to spend lots more time in my studio where I now work exclusively with digital art and design, as well as processes for printing on fabric, and in particular textured fabric.

I’ve also rediscovered my love of “working small” and have developed methods for preserving my digitally printed textile art so that it becomes durable and workable and suitable for using on items such as handbags, purses and accessories. My current ambition is to produce textile art that is beautiful but also practical; art that doesn’t necessarily need to hang on a wall or sit on a stand to be admired, it can also hang on your arm or be carried about with you.

Working with new technologies that intersect with artisan crafts is challenging and rewarding; new methods melding with old techniques resulting in textile art that is different, fresh and exciting.

Artist's Statement: Making art with fabric and thread is both a creative and an emotional experience for me, and I find my direction changing every so often. The older I get the more difficult it is to let go and move forward, and learning the futility of fighting the muse seems to be my life's greatest challenge. The only constant in my work seems to be the desire to encourage and inspire the creative spark that lives in each of us and ultimately I think, that is enough.

Location: Deland, Florida, USA

Online shops: Linda-Matthews

Blog: linda-matthews

Membership: SAQA

Languages spoken: English

Daisy Art Bag by Linda Matthews

Tags: textile art, fabric art, digital art, inkjet printing, printing on fabric, digital grounds, fabric paper, wearable art

Aynex Mercado

www.aynex.com

I started quilting in 1998. At first I did some traditional quilts but very quickly got bored following directions and patterns. I started adding my own ideas to patterns until I wasn't using patterns at all, working exclusively on art quilts. I have exhibited at the International Quilt Festival in Houston and The American Quilters Society Quilt Show in Paducah among others. I was the KY/TN Regional Representative for Studio Art Quilts Associates.

In 2008 my life changed and my main focus now is web design and graphic design although I still create quilts. As a quilter and web/graphic designer, I understand the needs of fiber artists better in terms of promotion and marketing their art. I would be happy to help other textile/fiber art businesses achieve a more professional image on the web and in print.

Location: Frederick, Maryland, USA
Blog: Aynex
Social Media: 
     Facebook, Twitter, YouTube
Languages spoken: English, Spanish

Matera by Aynex Mercado

 

   One of the many videos Aynex made when she lived in Paducah.
This one features Caryl Bryer Fallert.

Tags: art, quilt, graphic design, web design, abstract, architecture, maryland, quilting, designer