Mixed Media / Fiber Artist

This is how my journey began. Drawing cartoon characters such as Archie, Veronica and Disney characters occupied me as a young child. My family lived in the small town of Corning, California in the rural area where distractions were few. Drawing was a source of comfort to me. I could invent my own world on paper and illustrate things that I couldn’t say in words.

Coming from a family of an engineer, a geologist and a teacher, art wasn’t a way to make money. My family didn’t value art. So art was lost for a number of years until I started teaching school.

Motivation, inspiration, and creativity were the reasons for using art as a tool in teaching children to read and learn in the remedial classroom. It was a joy to see students excited about learning and be delighted when they saw their work being displayed on bulletin boards.

I stumbled on fiber art as I visited a quilt store. I was instantly awestruck by a pictorial art quilt made of cloth. The realization that an artist could make things with cloth hooked me in. I soon began using paints, fibers, and threads in art. They are the tools in which I am working. I guess you might say they are the voice in which I speak.

This past year my work has been displayed in galleries all over Oregon. My work was also displayed nationally and internationally.

I have also been awarded two awards.

One was a Judges choice award in Cary, North Carolina for Excellence in Design.

Another was an honorable mention in Artistic Value in Manchester, New Hampshire.

My work has also gone to The Netherlands this year for The Open European Championships in art quilts. I am a member of High Fiber Diet which is an off shoot of Columbia Fiber Arts Guild. I am also a member of SAQA, International Quilt Festival, American Quilter Society and Village Gallery of Arts.