SDA Michigan is all about connections. I know I crave connections with like minded people and suspect most of us do. We all live separate lives, but connect to others on many different levels. Because our state is so large, our connections to each other are made difficult. Not everyone is able to attend the SDA-Michigan meetings and workshops. Hopefully that will be changing for Northern and U.P. members with our newest ambassador, Jean Pratt. I am looking for someone to accept a similar volunteer position for our western Michigan area. Anyone want to step up? It may be an unpaid position, but I can testify that the rewards are many. My life has been greatly enriched by the friendships and connections I have made through SDA Michigan.
In order to enhance the physical connections, I thought it might be interesting to meet some of our members through interviews that can be shared with all of us. If you would like to interview another member, or write about yourself for inclusion on the blog, please do so and send the interviews to our blogger, Lynn Krawczyk,(tatgirl207@earthlink.net), or to me, Susie (skrage2@att.net). Include pictures if you can. We always like connecting a face and images of work to a name.
Susie
Introducing Lynn Krawczyk
As you all probably know, Lynn is our SDA-Michigan blogger. She says she is addicted to blogging and when asked to take over, she jumped right in to handle ours.
Lynn started her profession career as a mechanical engineer. She continues to work as an engineer designing transmissions and comes from a family of auto workers.
Do you ever wonder how fiber people get started in the field? Especially those who don’t have an art background? Lynn’s exposure was during a time when she had a back injury and had to limit her activity. She watched a quilting program on HGTV about crazy quilts. When she was able, she went to the library and took out all of the books available (6 of them) and started working.
Over time, Lynn’s shifted her interest toward making art quilts. Gradually the art quilts became more mixed media compositions. In fact, Lynn says she has been cutting up her old art quilts, sometimes into tiny pieces, and using them in her newer mixed media collage work.
Lynn’s early collages were quite small, (8 or 10” square) but recently she participated in a two person exhibit, Ragged Layers, at Huron Valley Art Center (with another SDA member, Jackie Lams) and made much larger work. Lynn collects and save anything she thinks might be useful in her collage work. She has even been known to use colored duct tape as part of the surface.
A bedroom of her home is her dedicated studio. She says the best feature is her print table with wheels and drop leaves. It allows her to move it as needed and to make it smaller when she needs to change her space. The worst feature is the mess she makes when she is in the midst of a project. She says she has 20 tons of paint and lots of fabric. I have often heard her say, “There is nothing a little paint won’t fix”.
You may wonder what Lynn does with so much paint. Besides her self admitted addiction to blogging, she also claims an addiction to thermofax screening. Earth tones are her favorite colors and Kona cotton her preferred fabric, “It makes such nice frayed edges when torn”. Although Lynn sometimes dyes her own fabric, she is not adverse to purchasing her favorite solid colors for use as a basis for screening.
Most of what Lynn does is self taught. She has only taken four classes to date. Her favorite teacher has been Carol Soderlund, who, she says, packs so much into a class.
When asked about the future of her work, Lynn says she is content for the moment exploring mixed media collage. Her goal is to refine her work to become more elegant.
Lynn wear many hats. Besides being a collage/mixed media artist, she is an engineer, a teacher, a blogger, and an author. She has written many articles for a variety of magazines including Quilting Arts, Cloth Paper Scissors and Sew Somerset.
I cherish my friendship with Lynn. She has a dry wit, writes beautifully, is a profound thinker who expresses herself very well, a kind and loyal friend and a super enthusiastic
and clever artist.
Visit Lynn on her blog (http://fibraartysta.blogspot.com/), her (website (http://www.fibraartysta.com/), or her Esty shop www.etsy.com/shop/FibraArtysta
Remnants Collage 12
Remnants Collage 15
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