NEWS•report
I have to report that NEWS 2013 was fantastic. From start to finish I was amazed and delighted at the spirit, talent and humor of the Trustees, faculty and participants. I taught a class in Deflected Doubleweave from Fri-Sun. I had ten wonderful participants who made my first on-loom teaching experience (other than youth classes and private students) pure joy and pleasure. As you can see below – excellent ladies. We are sadly missing Gwen Steege from the picture because she had to leave early, but managed to weave her entire sampler and scarf nonetheless.
I put together a unique warp and threading for each student, and they worked through 9 (or 15) treadling variations before beginning on a scarf based on their experiments. Quite a challenge right? But they got through it with great good humor, patience and aplomb.
You can see the working hands of accomplished weavers.
Diligently weaving away.
We had people on floor looms and table looms, but everyone managed to grasp the principles and teach me a thing or two.
There may have been a pause or two for contemplation, but then back to action.
Our guild and many of my pals had great showings in the gallery and fashion shows. Barbara Gordon, Barbara Hurley, Georgia Hadley, Deb Kaplan, Cathy Russell & Anita Thompson all won a prize or many prizes. Look for them on the NEWS website soon. Kudos!
I met several wonderful weavers whose work I have “virtually” admired: John Mularkey of Malarky Crafts http://www.malarkycrafts.com/, Norma Smayda of the Saunderstown Weaving School http://www.saunderstownweavingschool.com/, Margo Selby http://www.margoselby.com/, Kristin Kelley-Munoz – The Skiing Weaver https://www.facebook.com/handwovenbykristinkelley. And got to know others whose work I now admire: Kathy Grant who has been working hard tracing the roots of Southern Dimity with my mentor Ute Bargmann and Virginia Dow who teaches weaving and fiberarts to youth with special needs at http://triform.org/ AND the list goes on . . .
All in all, I am convinced that hand-weaving endures in New England in the skilled hands of a small but incredible group of enthusiasts.
Barbara Gordon
LIsa….how I wish that I could have taken your class! Looks like you laid out a wonderful program for that happy group. (Great pics, by the way!) I was very happy to have the opportunity to do “Crimp and Create” with Diane Totten who came from GA to teach. There were so many outstanding choices for study this time around; it made it very hard to choose.
Please consider repeating your program for your “local PEEPS” sometime soon, now that you have tested your workshop on NEWS guinea pigs!
The display of your defleected double weave pieces in the Faculty Show was awe inspiring! Truly….
Barbara G.
Elisabeth Hill
Wonderful to hear from you Barbara and wonderful to see you sweep the gallery and fashion awards:)) Truly well deserved! I am in awe of your precision and fearlessness in taking on new techniques. I feel like I am struggling with what my husband calls my “brute force” approach.
I felt the same way about all the classes – I was happy to teach but so sad to miss all the great classes I wanted to take: Margo Selby, Dianne Totten, John Mullarkey . . . and the list goes on. Sue Turner did an amazing job, and the increased registration really proved it.
I do feel like I worked out some kinks with my NEWS class, and I had an incredible group of student to do it with. Enthusiastic, smart, focused – I really couldn’t ask for a better group of students. I learned a lot.
Thanks for the comment . . . I am hoping that my home life will allow me to join Pioneer this year – evenings have been hard with my youngest still needing someone to crack the homework whip:) In any case, I would love to do an on or off-loom version of the class for anyone interested.
Again, many congratulations on your (many!!) wins.