I was born in 1947, and grew up in a small town in southern Indiana. I was an only child, and spent many happy hours at my grandma’s house down the street, making crafts and cooking, under her watch. My grandpa was an avid fisherman and would take me (his “pardner”) out before dawn, and on week-long summer trips to the lakes of Minnesota. We had a summer house my dad built from concrete block on Lake Shafer. At ten, I had a small skiff with an outboard, and explored the nooks of the lakeshore alone, imagining that I was an Indian.
When I discovered boys, I soon became a not-so-good student, and often found myself in the principal’s office. The counselor told me I was “not college material”, but my dad really wanted me to go to college. My mom enrolled me in modeling school so I would learn to behave like a lady, but what I liked was decorating the fashion shows. At the Indianapolis public library, to which I was allowed to drive my mom’s Lincoln, I made a fantastic discovery one day: a book about Picasso. I decided to become an artist, kept Picasso secret, and thought no one else really knew about him.
I learned of a test called SAT the day before I took it. I applied to Colorado State University and got in by a miracle (another story!), the year before they required a portfolio for art majors. I had taken no art classes at all.
I loved studio art classes at CSU. I had passionate discussions with my sculpture teacher, who thought that I should not paint my sculptures at all, much less purple and pink. It turns out I was right- the Greeks painted their marble sculptures, but the paint didn’t last two thousand years!
In my senior year I realized that a sculptor without a foundry couldn’t make much money, so signed up for one more year to get a teaching credential. After graduating from Colorado State University with a BFA in sculpture and a BA in education, I taught art in a large Boston area high school for seven years. Early on, I learned to teach by example, making large pots in the middle of the studio, next to the students. I insisted on showing their work twice yearly, and helped many students get into art school. Students appreciated a teacher with muddy hands.
I entered the MFA program at the Museum School as a clay sculptor and metalsmith, but soon changed direction: I took my work off the pedestal and out into the public. In fact, I climbed inside it, doing art performances in Boston, and in New York at the Kitchen and Franklin Furnace. Mine was the first MFA thesis performance by a sculptor at the Museum School. Big kinetic sculpture, made from lightweight materials, was my trademark.
After my MFA, I applied for several college teaching positions, and made it to the short list more than once, but always lost out to traditional bronze sculptors, men. Fabric is great, but it was pretty new then, and they didn’t take chances on a girl who didn’t obey the rules.
I met another artist at a show, Bill Moss, who made tents and other tension-fabric art. He helped me get a visiting artist position at Arizona State University. At ASU, teaching performance art and installation art, I realized that I needed more than just me to do large scale public art. So, after returning to Maine, I started Transformit, my art-based company, in 1987. As it turned out, running a company, even a small, intimate one like Transformit, took a lot of time and attention. Most of my art work in the past thirty years has been done in conjunction with Transformit, with the exception of a few solo Percent for Art projects along the way: Autumn Tumble, Penobscot Power, Aqua Vibrant.
I also had some civic engagements: nine years as a board member of the Merriconeag Waldorf School (now Maine Coast Waldorf School) in Freeport, Maine, and six years on the board of Maine College of Art (MECA). I was the only practicing artist. For years I have supported, through Transformit, numerous local charities with pro bono art installations for fund raising events.
From my time as a performance artist to the beginning of Transformit, and up to the present, I’ve maintained a passion for the now of things, and how something you’ve done is much more memorable than something you’ve read or watched.
At every stage of my career, I have worked to provoke public engagement with art. That is my passion.