I grew up in Baltimore and my family belonged to an Orthodox Synagogue, but by the time I came along, my mother no longer kept a kosher home. If anything, she was an early Beatnik and sent me to progressive camps and schools. I think this is where my social conscience developed.
All my life I have been making things. I have an early memory of being sick in bed in a dark room (measles?) making little figures with paper and whatever I could find. My mom taught me to knit and sew when I was 8 or 9. I spent many hours making clothes and blankets for my doll…an early iteration of Barbie.
I moved from Boston to Berkeley in 1965. Not to go to grad school — although I told my parents I was — but because of the FSM (Free Speech Movement). I had been very involved in civil rights and antiwar activities both in Baltimore and Boston. In 1966, I took a tapestry weaving and embroidery class at the Berkeley Adult School. That was it for me – I was hooked on textiles and fibers! I then studied with Ida Dean Grae at the Richmond Art Center. I also learned spinning and natural dyeing with Susan Druding.
By the early 1970s I had purchased a loom and spinning wheel and was busy weaving general home textiles and fabric for clothing.
For most of the time during the 1980s and 1990s I was working in the travel industry and raising two sons and didn’t have the time, energy or $ to do any textile work. I have gone back to it during my retirement, though.
I no longer weave on my large loom but work on a smaller scale, weaving narrow bands and working with a Japanese technique called kumihimo.
As many of you know, I do travel frequently and enjoy visiting makers in other cultures. All societies have textiles of one sort or another and I learn much from seeing all the various techniques … both differences and similarities.
