The curator selects three judges for the challenge. They are selected in July, and judge the challenge shortly after the entry deadline. To be considered as a judge for future challenges, or to recommend an individual, please contact the curator.
Many thanks to our judges for this year's challenge, Becky Bohlinger, Patt Blair, and Sonya Meyer (pictured below, left to right).
 |
Quilt Artist -
Tigard, OR
b.bohlinger@attbi.com
|
|
Becky Bohlinger has been sewing since she took home economics in junior high school. She is an accomplished seamstress and quilter, and her quilts have been shown and won awards in the Pacific Northwest. She's an active guild member of numerous guilds from Southern California to Oregon. Becky teaches quilting and sewing techniques in shops around Portland.
|
|
Quilt Artist - Anaheim Hills, CA
Email: pblair@sbcglobal.net, Website:
www.pattsart.com |
|
I am in reality and at heart an Oklahoma farm girl relocated to Southern California. I’ve been involved in some form of visual or written creative expression since my mid teens. Initially, it was using oils, then brush and pen lettering, and finally discovering the joy and spontaneity of watercolors in the '70s. Full time left brain (telecommunications) work, coupled with college and children limited visual arts creativity for much of the '80s and into the next decade. In the mid-90s, I began weekend morning walks in the park with friends who happened to be quilters.
After a year or so of not knowing what they were talking about, I decided I might learn a bit about this quilting thing. I tried, but am not a skilled traditional quilter. I admit to not liking it as much, mostly I think because the creativity I could find in my early quilting works was limited to fabric choices / color selections. I think I’d already had too many years wandering around in traditional art media to start fitting into even a partial preplan. That’s a nice way of saying, I was previously ruined. I do love traditional quilts and have great respect and appreciation of quilters that piece and appliqué. In 2001, I stumbled on to a two-day painting with dye class. At last, I could resurrect use of some paint brushes. As soon as I figured out how to marry up my earlier painting experiences with fabric, I was in heaven. I likewise enjoy the challenge of enhancing a quilt top with the line/lines in machine quilting. And thread... well it’s just linear paint! I love it!
I continued to develop skills, varied media use, and interests such that in 2003, I started competing and placing in local and nationally judged contests.
Out of some deeply seated need to continue my own growth and find more people that like what I like, I began teaching in 2004. I love the classroom environment. There’s something magical about the harmony that materializes in a room of quilters at work. It’s a peaceful, playful rhythm. It’s just plain fun. It’s important to me that people in my classes relax, have fun, learn, and conclude class with a sense of accomplishment and pride. |
|
Doll Artist -
Laramie, WY
wildcat@uwyo.edu
|
|
Sonya is on the faculty at the University of Wyoming in the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences’ Textiles and Merchandising program. She enjoys sharing her passion for costume and design with her students, especially in the program’s historic clothing and pattern design/making courses. Sonya has also served as the coordinator of the programs international study tours to Italy and the United Kingdom.
Sonya claims to have been a doll collector/maker for as long as she can remember. Her mother was a doll maker, and as a child she would make crude dolls and design clothes for them. She also helped her mother make doll clothes for her nieces numerous dolls. She admits to still owning every doll she ever received. While still in high school she started her first “real” collection of dolls from other countries; a collection she continues today.
Although Sonya started making dolls with her mother as a young girl, it has only been recently that she started working in the art doll medium. She finds it extremely rewarding and relaxing creating a cloth art doll. She feels fortunate that she can use these creations as part of her scholarship and teaching activities. She relies on her pattern making skills to create original dolls and costumes. By being involved in this design process herself, Sonya models the design and competition entry process for her apparel design students.
Sonya has had dolls in the 2004 and 2005 Hoffman Challenge shows as well as Everyone Loves Sulky Doll Challenge and Quilting Arts doll Challenge.
Degrees: BSE, 1973, Emporia State University; M.S. 1983, Kansas State University; Ph.D., 1986, Kansas State University. |
|
