Instructor Bios

Kris Abshire (Alaska) www.krisabshire.com

Kris has lived and worked in Alaska 40 years, increasingly pursuing her creative use as a self-taught weaver and surface design textile artist over the past 20 years.

Anne Field (New Zealand) www.annefield.co.nz

Anne has been weaving and spinning since 1962, and for the past 25 years has been teaching regularly in New Zealand, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. Her work has been entered in many exhibitions, both in New Zealand and overseas. As an international teacher, weaver, spinner and writer, her work has done much to promote New Zealand fibre craft abroad. Anne’s many published books include Collapse Weave: Creating Three Dimensional Cloth (2007), upon which her workshop is based. Anne has her studio in the Arts Centre in Christchurch, New Zealand where she works on her 16-shaft AVL, computer-assisted loom.

Mary Frame (BC)

Mary Frame is a weaver and a specialist in ancient Andean textiles, who researches and writes on techniques, patterns, gender, and iconography. She also has a deep interest in Andean village weaving of the present day, and has made collections for the UBC Museum of Anthropology.

James Koehler (New Mexico) www.geocities.com/jamesrkoehler

James Koehler is an internationally recognized tapestry artist whose work can be found in several museum, corporate and private collections including the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He began weaving in 1977 and has worked with numerous students since the mid-1980’s.

Judith Olney (Massachusetts) http://juditholney.com

Judith Olney has been making baskets for 30 years and teaching for basketry suppliers,guilds, and art centers as well as basketry and fiber conferences for 28 years. She has studied in England and Japan, as well as with many American basketmakers. Although she employs many different techniques and a wide variety of materials in her own weaving, Judith prefers to design baskets for teaching that incorporate weaving techniques and concepts that apply to all baskets. Reed is her material of choice for teaching. She is happiest when she feels her students are learning something they will enhance their own work.

Kaija Rautiainen (BC) www.kaijart.com

Kaija Rautiainen uses the very ancient medium of weaving combined with cutting edge technology in her images of west coast nature. She went from using a traditional tapestry technique to computer-aided weaving to realize her interest in creating works that marry image and structure. She has exhibited her work internationally including the American Tapestry Alliance biennales and the Cheongju International Crafts Biennale 2009. She is a recipient of the City of Seattle Arts Award and her work can be found in corporate and private collections. She studied fibre arts in her native Finland and holds a BA in Textile Arts Education. She currently lives and works in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Cameron Taylor-Brown (California) www.camerontaylor-brown.com

Cameron has immersed herself in the worlds of fiber, education and commerce since the 1970s. She studied fiber art at the University of California, Berkley with artist Ed Rossbach and textile design at the Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science. She worked in New York City as a stylist of upholstery and home furnishing fabrics, taught textile design at the Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science and worked as an exhibition curator. Since 1985, Taylor-Brown has lived in Los Angeles where she maintains a studio and is active in several arts organizations. She was a founding board member of the Textile Group of Los Angeles, is President of California Fibers, and is a board member of Designing Weavers.

Her artwork is widely exhibited and has been published in American Craft, Fiberarts, Shuttle, Spindle and Dyepot and the several of the Fiberarts Design Books. An experienced teacher and facilitator, Cameron conducts workshops throughout the country exploring design, color, creativity and the collaborative process.