I have always been drawn to sewing and art. Even as a child I loved creating on my mom’s old singer. Not having the
ability, or knowledge of how to follow a pattern, I figured out how to construct doll and baby clothes on my own. I was
successful at figuring out the sewing machine, and eventually, with my mom’s coaching, I did learn how to use and follow
a pattern. When I was old enough to take home economics, I was excited. My junior high teacher, the same for all three
years, managed to suck all of the joy out of sewing with her rigid style of teaching and plethora of rules.
Life happened while I continued to do a very occasional sewing project. When my youngest son graduated from high
school, and ventured out on his own, I suffered horribly from “empty nest” syndrome. I repainted my son’s room and
hauled my mom’s old singer and cabinet into the room, and set up my first sewing room. A new quilt fabric store opened
up near my place of work, and one day I decided to stop in, and ended up buying a small wall quilt. I was under the
impression that quilting meant piecing one inch squares together and was never interested in such a dull, boring hobby.
Living in Alaska at the time, I soon discovered the fiber art quilt movement, which is huge in Alaska. Living in such a
beautiful place can be awe inspiring and definitely pulled me in the art direction. I discovered the joy of camaraderie and
support that quilters share. I was fortunate to have fabulous creative teachers, and made many friends on this journey.
I love creating portraits, and landscape scenes using the fusible appliqué technique. The magic of recreating a picture or
portrait into a quilt never ceases to amaze me. Working within value, color and texture, fabric is the perfect medium. I
especially love the challenge of commission work, as well as doing all of my grandchildren and other family members.
Also, I love doing iconic, famous portraits such as the Girl With the Pearl, Tupac and Harriet Tubman.
I work from a high resolution image, edit the picture, and make a pattern. I then audition different fabrics and start the
construction of the piece. After fusing, I place image on a background, layer, and finally quilt the piece.
Welcome to Marilyn S DeVries
Fiber Art
Fiber art refers to fine art whose material consists of natural or synthetic fiber and other components, such as fabric or yarn. It
focuses on the materials and on the manual labor on the part of the artist as part of the works' significance, and prioritizes aesthetic
value over utility.
The term fiber art came into use by curators and art historians to describe the work of the artist-craftsman following World War II.
Those years saw a sharp increase in the design and production of "art fabric." In the 1950s, as the contributions of craft artists
became more recognized, not just in fiber but in clay and other media, an increasing number of weavers began binding fibers into
nonfunctional forms as works of art.
The 1960s and 70s brought an international revolution in fiber art. Beyond weaving, fiber structures were created through knotting,
twining, plaiting, coiling, pleating, lashing, and interlacing. Artists in the United States and Europe explored the qualities of fabric to
develop works that could be hung or free standing, two or three dimensional, flat or volumetric, many stories high or miniature,
nonobjective or figurative, and representational or fantasy. The women's movement of the same era was important in contributing to
the rise of fiber art because of the traditional association of women with textiles in the domestic sphere, indeed, many of the most
prominent fiber artists are women.
Since the 1980s, fiber work has become more and more conceptual, influenced by postmodernist ideas. For fiber artists, in addition
to long-standing experimentation with materials and techniques, this brought a new focus on creating work which confronted
cultural issues such as gender, feminism, domesticity and the repetitive tasks related to women's work, politics, the social and
behavioral sciences, material specific concepts related to fiber's softness, permeability, drapeability, and so on.
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