Landmarks Gallery - First Floor
Birds of a Fiber
January 24 - March 24, 2024 A celebration of all things ornithological and in collaboration with the La Conner Birding Festival. Birds of a Fiber 2024 is the 6th anniversary for this annual exhibit. The first Birds of a Fiber exhibit was in 2018 when the La Conner Chamber of Commerce began an annual Birding Festival. At the time, the Museum’s Executive Director and avid birder Amy Green, was on the Chamber’s Board of Directors. She was so inspired that she came back to the Museum to work with then Curator, Jenny Walker, to make space on the exhibition calendar to collaborate on this community event. The first exhibition in 2018 presented 25 pieces from local artists. Since then, the exhibit has garnered the attention of artists from Canada, Australia, Japan, Israel, Belgium, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and all across America. This year’s exhibit had 165 entries, of which, 64 pieces were selected to be included. The exhibit has become much-anticipated, with artists beginning to inquire about it as early as August of the year prior. La Conner and the surrounding Skagit Valley offers an authentic experience for birders. The farmlands, wetlands, prairies, forests and marine environment provide ideal habitats for a host of different species of birds, including those that migrate from Siberia and Alaska. Along with the huge flocks of migrating Snow Geese and Trumpeter Swans, you can also see a large variety of raptor species, meadow and water birds such as Killdeer, American Kestrels, Northern Pintails, Red-tailed Hawks and of course, Bald Eagles. You can even take a short boat ride from La Conner to see Tufted Puffins, Mandarin Ducks and Cormorants! For more information on birding in Skagit Valley, click here. Artists Include: Adeline Gildow Bridget Daly Cameron Taylor Brown Carolyn Higgins Caryl Gentry Chandra Wu Constance Perenyi Crystal Colombo Deb Zelenak Debbie Watkins Deborah Eliasen Debra Olson Franki Kohler Gale Whitney Gina Gahagan Glenda Mah Jan Avent Jane Clark Janette Keller Jennie Turner Jerri Stroud Joyce Lepine Julie Sevilla Drake Kasey Kathy Meier Kathi Beery Kathy Kerler Laura Elmore Laurie Nari Haig Lorraine Roy Lynne Kirsten Marian Eason Martha Shade Martha Wolfe Mary Auld Megan Zaniewski Melanie Marr Pam Seaberg Paula Perez Penelope Bourk Rebecca Reeves Sally Nole Sara Lamb Sheila Saxon Sheri Nemerson Sonia Grasvik Stephanie Eland Suzanne Uschold Terry Aske |
Second Floor
Shift Change
Curated by Brian Nigus March 6 - April 28, 2024 This exhibit is a “sampler platter” of interests from the Museum’s new Curator, Brian Nigus. “It’s not every day that a museum hires a curator,” is the quote that became the catalyst for Shift Change. After a year of coordinating pre-existing exhibitions, organizing shows from the Museum’s permanent collection and filling in calendar gaps where possible, the Museum is proud to present the first start-to-finish, group exhibition, put together by its new Curator. Shift Change not only refers to a new staff member starting their “shift,” but also references the shift that happens at a museum when a new curator is hired, acknowledging the reality of a different perspective and broader selection of artists. Shift Change contains 21 artists from across the US and Canada, all of them working in quilt and fiber arts, the Museum’s namesake mediums, and all of them first-time exhibitors at the Museum. In particular, the exhibition includes modern and contemporary quilting, weaving, knitting, punch-needle, sculptures and other fiber art forms. The exhibitors have a combined resume that includes, but is not limited to, being in the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, the National Quilt Museum and the Cranbrook Art Museum. Solo exhibitions at the National Quilt Museum, Bellevue Arts Museum and the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. Artist Residencies at the Recology King County Program, the Soulangh Cultural Park in Taiwan and the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. Multiple invitees of the Dairy Barn Art Center’s Quilt National, the creator of A$ap Rocky’s 2021 Met Gala reveal, a Neddy Award Finalist and every artist combining for over half a million followers on Instagram. Artists Include: Liv Aanrud Max Adrian Margot Becker Jes Le Bon Lee Davignon Julie Sevilla Drake Audrey Esarey Zak Foster Julian Jamaal Jones Millicent Kennedy Chawne Kimber Taylor Krz Mashanda Lazarus Marc Manke Amanda Nadig Heidi Parkes Helen Parsons Kendall Ross Allyson Rousseau Joey Veltkamp Adeline Wang |
Third Floor
Stone Portraits
and Sacred Stonescapes Denise Labadie February 7 - May 5, 2024 Denise Labadie makes art quilts of megalithic stones and monoliths, and more recent monastic ruins. These history-rich structures are timeless, with the resulting quilts oftentimes evoking emotional, almost cellular remembrances of human pasts largely forgotten, and of feelings rarely surfaced. Denise's quilts are known for their moody and emotional realism – true-to-life stones and abstract landscapes – and, technically, for their assertive quilt top textures, hand-painted fabrics, the integrated use of multiple appliqué techniques, subtle color complexity, light management and shadowing, perspective, and craftsmanship and technique precision. Viewers often feel – particularly with her portals and passageways – that these story-telling quilts actually “pull them in”, that they want to actually go into and through them. Viewers are also fascinated that she constructs her quilts very much the same way as a stone mason builds a wall – individually cutting and appliquéing each stone (from her hand-painted fabric), one by one, working from the ground up. Labadie's goal is for fiber art to be seen as fine art – art that moves the viewer, evokes emotion, seems alive, makes you feel or remember something important, makes you want to go there, makes you want to be there now, in the moment. Her "stones" portfolio now exceeds 50 quilts. She is a multiple Quilt National (USA) award winner and her work is widely published. Labadie has had major solo exhibitions at both the US National Quilt Museum and multiple national quilt exhibitions worldwide including China, France, Italy, Germany, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, South Korea, and Spain. |
UPCOMING EXHIBITS
La Conner in Bloom Challenge | March 27 - April 28, 2024
Marie O'Kelley | May 1 - June 2, 2024
New Meditation - Silks & Weavings from Melissa Paré & Audrey Ducas | May 1 - July 7, 2024
Word Quilts by Janine Holzman | May 8 - July 28, 2024
A Look Through Americana - From the Permanent Collection | June 5 - 30, 2024
Marie O'Kelley | May 1 - June 2, 2024
New Meditation - Silks & Weavings from Melissa Paré & Audrey Ducas | May 1 - July 7, 2024
Word Quilts by Janine Holzman | May 8 - July 28, 2024
A Look Through Americana - From the Permanent Collection | June 5 - 30, 2024