~ Collaborations ~

Liz Spear

A few years ago an amazing, very talented weaver friend and I began collaborating on jackets and coats. Liz Spear lives in North Carolina. We meet each year at the Piedmont Craftsmen Fair in Winston-Salem and discuss fiber and make plans for our next collaborations.  

She weaves wonderful large coats that she calls Celebration coats - and we decided several years ago to make our first endeavor a Mountain Celebration Coat. I did three panels of abstracted mountains and waterfalls and trees and she wove the sleeves, side panels and the collar. It has been in numerous exhibitions since its inception.

This first collaboration was so successful that we continued by making jackets and shirts with my quilted insets as part of the work. The first jacket we did was the one I wore to my daughter's wedding rehearsal dinner party.   We are also planning a new celebration coat in the near future. Look for it here.

These are available through either one of us. Samples are shown here and also on Liz's website. www.lizspearhandwoven.com

Bo Berry

My extremely talented sister-in-law calls herself an agri-artist because of her oil paintings of animals, farms, and country landscapes. However - she is much more than that - and says of her work - "In our world of high technology and busy, complicated lives I am drawn back to the innocence and peace of the rural scenes, the gentle farm animals and the bounty of the good earth. I can only hope that my passion to honor this way of life and the animals that help to sustain it will be conveyed to the viewer."  

She usually works on stretched canvas, masonite or old wood - but recently she has been doing small vignettes on un-stretched canvas for me. I then take the piece and put a quilted collage around it and frame it in a box frame.

This is definitely a collaboration that is going to continue!