by Sherrye WyattNatalie Olsen
thegnat@whidbey.com
thegnat@whidbey.com
http://www.natalieolsen.com/
5505 Shore Meadow Road, Freeland
Type of artwork – what medium: Fiber art (weaving), mixed media
How long have you been an artist? During my college years (1957–’61) I made money by drawing cartoons and selling custom cartoon greeting cards. I guess that counts. I took my first weaving class in 1972, and started exhibiting and selling my work the same year. I’ve been weaving ever since – 37 years!
Artist statement: I like to break the rules of traditional tapestry, weaving curves instead of straight lines, odd-shaped pieces rather than rectangular ones. As weaving trends today move toward finer threads and computer-generated designs, I find myself going back to my organic 3-D weaving, picking up themes from nature as I did when I began to weave more than 35 years ago.
What is interesting and distinctive about you and your artwork? My tapestry pieces are shaped, manipulated both on the loom and after I take them off. I work with yarn, metal, plastic, glass, paper, silk fusion and hand-dyed and hand-felted materials.
Why do you create? What are you passionate about? Why? Certainly not for the money or the fame! I guess I just can’t help it. I love to work with textures and colors. I also love working with my husband Earl, a photographer (we’ve been married more than 46 years). Last year we both had to drop out of the studio tour at the last minute because of his backpacking accident, rescue and airlift to Harborview. Now, after nine months, he’s nearly back to normal.
What projects are you currently working on? Any upcoming shows? For the past year I’ve been weaving shaped tapestry fish from natural & synthetic yarns, metalics, acrylics and recycled materials. Two of my fish are in a juried exhibit, “Fish Follies 2009” at the Cordova Museum in Cordova, Alaska (June through beginning of September). My husband got a kick out of my mailing fish to Alaska. This fall I’ll be part of a show in Edison-Bow and one at the Penn Cove Pottery Gallery in Coupeville. Another one coming up in January is at the Quilt & Textile Museum in La Conner.
What will guests see you doing at your studio during the Whidbey Island Open Studio Tour? I hope they WON’T see me still doing my once-a-year cleaning before the studio tour! They’ll see works in progress on looms, on tables and walls, and I’ll describe the processes I go through to complete a piece.
Choose a piece that you will have for sale on the OST and describe why you created it, your feelings when you created it, and the process you went through. “Salmon Ella,” my latest fish. I love picking out the colors, trying for iridescence, weaving so the colors blend, then shaping it over wire mesh (Gutter Guard). I need to buy her false eyelashes this week…
5505 Shore Meadow Road, Freeland
Type of artwork – what medium: Fiber art (weaving), mixed media
How long have you been an artist? During my college years (1957–’61) I made money by drawing cartoons and selling custom cartoon greeting cards. I guess that counts. I took my first weaving class in 1972, and started exhibiting and selling my work the same year. I’ve been weaving ever since – 37 years!
Artist statement: I like to break the rules of traditional tapestry, weaving curves instead of straight lines, odd-shaped pieces rather than rectangular ones. As weaving trends today move toward finer threads and computer-generated designs, I find myself going back to my organic 3-D weaving, picking up themes from nature as I did when I began to weave more than 35 years ago.
What is interesting and distinctive about you and your artwork? My tapestry pieces are shaped, manipulated both on the loom and after I take them off. I work with yarn, metal, plastic, glass, paper, silk fusion and hand-dyed and hand-felted materials.
Why do you create? What are you passionate about? Why? Certainly not for the money or the fame! I guess I just can’t help it. I love to work with textures and colors. I also love working with my husband Earl, a photographer (we’ve been married more than 46 years). Last year we both had to drop out of the studio tour at the last minute because of his backpacking accident, rescue and airlift to Harborview. Now, after nine months, he’s nearly back to normal.
What projects are you currently working on? Any upcoming shows? For the past year I’ve been weaving shaped tapestry fish from natural & synthetic yarns, metalics, acrylics and recycled materials. Two of my fish are in a juried exhibit, “Fish Follies 2009” at the Cordova Museum in Cordova, Alaska (June through beginning of September). My husband got a kick out of my mailing fish to Alaska. This fall I’ll be part of a show in Edison-Bow and one at the Penn Cove Pottery Gallery in Coupeville. Another one coming up in January is at the Quilt & Textile Museum in La Conner.
What will guests see you doing at your studio during the Whidbey Island Open Studio Tour? I hope they WON’T see me still doing my once-a-year cleaning before the studio tour! They’ll see works in progress on looms, on tables and walls, and I’ll describe the processes I go through to complete a piece.
Choose a piece that you will have for sale on the OST and describe why you created it, your feelings when you created it, and the process you went through. “Salmon Ella,” my latest fish. I love picking out the colors, trying for iridescence, weaving so the colors blend, then shaping it over wire mesh (Gutter Guard). I need to buy her false eyelashes this week…
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