Celebrating its ninth year, the North Olympic Fiber Arts Festival is Oct. 3-5.
The festival has been an ongoing annual interactive fiber arts event the first weekend in October connecting to the community with activities like a museum exhibition, educational demonstrations of fiber processes, hands-on projects with children and adults, sale of local artists work, workshops, lectures, wearable art shows and information about local fiber activities, groups, businesses and instructional resources.
The North Olympic Fiber Arts Festival is always free to the public and more information can be found at FiberArtsFestival.org.
Each year there is a special theme used for the festival and exhibition at the Museum & Arts Center juried and curated by the festival director, Renne Emiko Brock-Richmond. For 2014 the theme is “Parallel Patterns – Significant Schemes, Seams & Symbols” that reveals meaningful themes, designs and relationships through fiber, fabric and fashions with creative consideration that reflects and sometimes repeats imaginative motives, motifs, lines and serendipity.
The exhibition is open to all fiber arts media and encourages works that are old, new, collaborations, fine art and functional crafts. Artists from both West and East Coasts, the Southwest, the Midwest and South are in the exhibition including Claire Murray Adams, Shirley Anderson, Joyce Alford, Judy Anderson, Deborah Babin, Lynn Baritelle, Renee Bova, Renne Emiko Brock-Richmond, Bonnie Bucknam, Betty Busby, Mary Ann Clayton, Marca Davies, Lindy Feigenbutz, Marijane Figg, Susanne Foster, MarySue French, Christiane Gass-Johnson, Pamela Hastings, Kathy Hogan, Beatrice Idris, Jess Jones, Georgia Kennedy, Robin Leja, Mary Liebsch, Susan McClelland, Dorothy McGuiness, Donna McMillen, Mikie Morris, Geri Mylchreest, Sherry Nagel, Sue Nylander, Betty Oppenheimer, Barbara O’Steen, Judith Roderick, Diane Ross, Sandra Rude, Peggy St. George, Sandy Schlecter, Gloria Skovronsky, Joy Stockdale, Stephanie Swensson, Deborah Taylor, Joanne Thoma, Marla Varner, Miggles Wallace, Marian Wilson, and the Fiber Arts Bombardiers.
The festival has entwined partnerships starting with the North Olympic Shuttle & Spindle Guild and Museum & Art Center in the Sequim-Dungeness Valley, while each year it grows to including more educational and arts nonprofits and organizations like the Clallam Farm Tour, Strait Knitters Guild, Sunbonnet Sue Quilt Club, Sequim Farmers Market, Peninsula College, and many more during this three-day celebration including the First Friday Art Walk, Fiber Arts Extravaganza and workshops.
Friday, Oct. 3, launches the “Parallel Patterns” art exhibition opening at the Museum & Arts Center, 175 W. Cedar St., in downtown Sequim from 5-8 p.m. Starting at 10 a.m., Saturday, Oct. 4, is the Fiber Arts Extravaganza that includes demonstrations of different fiber art methods, a fiber arts market with local artists selling fiber to finished products. Meet the creators of the “Parallel Patterns” art exhibition at an artists’ reception from noon-3 p.m.
The Fiber Arts Extravaganza happens at the Museum & Arts Center inside and out. Sunday, Oct. 5, welcomes visitors to the exhibit and for small fees you can learn new fiber art techniques at workshops offered at the Museum & Arts Center.
Looking ahead to inspire your creativity, the themes for the upcoming North Olympic Fiber Arts Festival are:
2015 – “Fostered Fiber – Remembrance, Remnants & Mentors”
2016 – “Material Measurement – Magnitude, Meaning & Makers”
2017 – “Threads Count – Textiles, Technology & Tales.”
