2023 Program Archives

Both the past and the future find a place in Van Herpen’s creations seemingly becoming one. Traditional Couture techniques, like hand-stitching, embroidering, or draping, lie at the core of the maison’s craft. Yet by developing and experimenting novel and innovative materials, previously unthinkable notions of Haute Couture are weaved into the creative process. Van Herpen seamlessly blends delicate handwork with radical forward-facing technologies such as laser-cutting, injection moulding, magnetic weaving or 3D printing to create unparalleled patterns and silhouettes.

DR. KAREN ZUPANIC

Jeanene Evans

Jeanene Evans has recently taken the leap to follow her dreams and pursue her calling as an artist. As a child, her creativity was fueled by her father’s woodworking skills and her mother’s painting and sewing. Her mother taught her to sew, and one of her first projects was a red bandana print dress with white rick-rack. Jeanene's love of sewing grew throughout high school, leading her to pursue a degree in Home Economics and Marketing.

A subsequent career in retail buying led to her visiting factories and showrooms across the USA, Europe, and Asia. One fortuitous assignment took her to Italy, where she fell in love with that country's beautiful papers and exquisite leathers and tooling methods.

In 2016, Jeanene began taking classes in bookbinding at the Craft Guild of Dallas, discovering in this artform a way to apply her existing skills in sewing and visual design in ways that bring new life to traditional materials. Following in her father's footsteps as a precision woodworker, she has recently turned her attention to making boxes, and she continues to take classes to learn new techniques in bookbinding, mixed media, and sewing. Jeanene currently lives in Addison, Texas, with her husband.

Rebecca Shanks

Fibers, creating with cloth, and building things by hand have been a lifelong passion for Rebecca Shanks. She is happy to be sewing, weaving on her loom, caning chair seats, or creating baskets.  Rebecca travels to take basket classes in more traditional materials, then interprets them in paper form. She finds that working with heavy-duty cotton watercolor paper allows her to control the color of her baskets and to create unique forms and color combinations.

Rebecca is an active member of Dallas Handweavers and Spinners, as well as Contemporary Handweavers of Texas.

Christine Miller

Christine Miller is a lifelong fiber artist with experience in weaving, sewing, basketry, embroidery, felting, dyeing, knitting, crochet, and fiber sculpture. She is a former visual arts educator with local and national arts education recognition. She continues teaching in K - 12 programs through her Visiting Artist presentation about Fibers in the 21^st Century with STEAM applications.

Christine conducts fiber-related classes and workshops and is available for art commissions. You may contact her via email at christinekmillerfiberartist@gmail.com.

Her new book, Weaving with Wire, will be published August 28, 2023, by Schiffer. It can be preordered from https://schifferbooks.com/collections/schiffer-craft-weaving/products/weaving-with-wire.

Nancy Tully

As a young child, Nancy Tully’s favorite aunt taught her to knit. In a single afternoon she learned to cast on stitches and learned the knit stitch. She absolutely fell in love with the feel of yarn running through her fingers and the slow but sure progress of making a baby blanket for one of her dolls. There was only one hitch with that experience. The lesson took place in her aunt’s home in Chicago, and there was not enough time for her to teach Nancy how to cast off the stitches. She has long since forgotten how many times she pulled her doll’s blanket to only see it unravel.

So began her life as a fiber artist. Throughout the years, she has taken up knitting, crochet, hand embroidery, and the occasional sewing project. And in the last five years, she has turned her attention to art quilts, and has been a member of the North Texas SAQA group since 2019. There have been some gifted instructors from whom she has been fortunate to learn, but she is primarily self-taught. In 2017, she began working with Jane Dunnewold through her Creative Strength Training program. Within that community, she learned the value of channeling her creative efforts into a variety of mediums, including abstraction and collage. She is also an avid participant of the Stitch Club offered by Textile Artist.org.

There are aspects of that first knitting lesson that have stayed with her throughout the years. First, her love for fiber was instilled that day. Second, she became very adept at starting over and over again on a project when things weren’t working out. And perhaps most importantly, she learned to ask how she could make it work.   

As a fiber artist who is primarily self-taught, these three precepts have guided her process throughout the years:  Do I love the material with which I am working? Am I prepared to start over until I get right? How can I make this work?

Corey Godfrey

Corey Godfrey is a German-born practicing artist who has lived in Dallas for over 15 years. She completed her art education in drawing and painting at the University of North Texas, where she received her BFA in 2008. While studying, she began experimenting in “craft” mediums, until she uncovered her true love, yarn.

In using yarn, she is reflecting the strength in a craft connected historically with women. Corey’s subjects of her works reflect imagery that links back to her dreams, which have continuously been the starting point for each of her series, since she began as an artist.

Her current artistic practice, using yarn as her primary medium, is driven by a desire to showcase strength and beauty in all women and the connection between females and nature, all of which endure immense environmental obstacles to reveal their true forms. Abundant in color and full of various textures, the material and subjects are truly celebrated in every piece. The viewer is invited to get close to the works and feel the sense of “home” that each work provokes.

Corey works as an artist, assistant producer and administrative assistant for a

public arts organization. She continues to grow her social connection and activism within the Dallas community. 

We learned to create a fun fiber brooch with a zipper and a vintage button! 

Attendees brought a $5 kit fee and their To-Go Kits supplemented by neutral sewing thread and sewing needles.

Adriana "Andie" Comini, Exhibits Director

"Slow down! Stop the car!"

These are often the words of Andie Comini as she keeps her eyes peeled for any item on the curb she might be able to incorporate into an art piece.

Andie's journey to becoming a mixed media fiber artist began with stained glass and mosaic work. Her love of color and texture soon had her combining these elements with paper, fabric, metal, plastic, and foam along with found objects. Her art studio is filled with all kinds of materials just waiting to be brought together in a piquant or poignant piece. Her goal is to incorporate items into something that will spark people’s imagination and produce a smile!

Andie, an active member of the Dallas Area Fiber Artists and both the Dallas and Bonham Creative Arts Centers, continues to be an enthusiastic participant in numerous art and gallery shows.

Sharon Zigrossi

Sharon Zigrossi started using hub caps as her ‘canvas’ over 14 years ago and now she has a large collection of rescued hub caps waiting for their turn! Her business, Blooming Hub Caps, began with the first sunflower hub cap painted for the garden and has developed into intricate assemblage art pieces. 

With a BS Design Degree from Buffalo State College, Sharon has started to revisit her love of textile pattern design. Often her hub caps’ surfaces are painted in floral patterns and she has made a series of crazy quilt inspired pieces where the fabric was painted instead of sewn. 

Sharon loves to share the fun of creative recycling with others and teaches hub cap painting workshops. Her art is available on ETSY.com and locally at Makers Connect and has been displayed at juried shows at the Bath House Cultural Center, Texas Discovery Gardens in Dallas, Gallery On The Square in Alpine and as a featured artist at the City of Lubbock’s “Hot Wheels” Art Festival. 

More info can be found at the Blooming Hub Caps website, IG, FB and Etsy shop.   https://linktr.ee/BloomingHubCaps

Laura Fox-Wallis

Laura Fox-Wallis is a fiber artist, art educator, and master silk painter who works with mixed media, silk, and watercolor.

In 2004, she began to explore the diverse effects of silk painting and found a strong connection with the fluid movement and brilliant colors of the dye. When the brush touches the silk there is beauty in the mixture of two mediums, creating satisfaction in the understanding of such a meticulous process.

Laura Fox-Wallis' work is fueled by nature, the breadth of colors, textures, and organic shapes and forms. Her works are the mixture of abstraction and reality which reflect her particular experiences in life. She is interested in design, arranging shapes and colors while exploring the diversity of forms and structures. Painting with dyes on silk is like a dance of control, creating variable compositions through graceful shifting and layering of elements. 

In 2020, Fox-Wallis was awarded the Master Silk Painter (MSP) title by Silk Painters International (SPIN), an  organization of silk artists, educators, and practitioners. A Master Silk Painter is considered an outstanding silk artist in their skills, creativity and expertise in usage of silk and dyes, design and color. When chosen, by committee, MSP status is considered to be a lifelong award.

To view her professional CV, click here.

June Colburn

Sewing since elementary school, June learned patchwork techniques while living in Holland in the mid-1970’s, where she was a middle school librarian. A few years later, when she moved to new countries and schools, she began sharing those lessons in Switzerland and then in Japan, where she taught for the YMCA Cross-Cultural Center for 10 years.

June’s fascination with kimono fabrics defined a new creative direction, as she designed home accessories, quilts, and wearable art clothing sold twice a year in the kimono department of the Daimaru Department Store in Kobe and annually at the Tokyo American Club.  She won a first-place award in the Kobe City Fashion Design Contest with a patchwork suit. Her quilts were included in exhibits of work by resident foreign artists twice at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art.

After returning to the U.S. in 1993, June launched a career fueled by her love of sharing Japanese design in her classes and lectures, patterns, magazine articles, solo and group exhibits, appearances on “Simply Quilts”, and Bernina Fashion Show garments. She’s recently begun work on a book, which will be finished--eventually.

 https://junecolburn.com/