Handcraft skills through the centuries have been an essential part of domestic living. Fibers harvested, spun, woven and made into warm clothing eventually became scraps for the hook or needle to re-connect into decorative household goods. Who were the makers and their stories? So many unknown by name but personable in designs.

Today with the digital age, creatives share process images under their profiles, showing the spaces they work, materials collected, and especially tools and techniques. Researchers 50 years from now will thank us all for including these details. (Believe me from past experience trying to learn about the McDonald sisters and their work practices.). Search contemporary rug hooking, fiber arts, hooked art.

Over the past several months I have “met” many contemporaries via a network of fiber organizations and professionals. On this International Rug Hooking Day, December 4, here are a few.

Karen D. Miller Studio from Ottawa, ON Canada . Karen is an author, fibre artist, instructor and mother – click for the collection Motherhood. She is coordinating a series of fibre artists lecturing In the Studio you can find these events on her website KarenDMiller.com . Past visits have introduced us to Larry Weyand from Newfoundland, Nadine Flagel from Vancouver, BC, Patti Mullins Colen from London, ON among many others. Coming up next is Tracy Jamar, NYC on Jan 13, 2021.

I have curated some of these into a collection of hooked art from a series of zoom conversations with creatives who responded to socio political events for a future post. The book Crafting Dissent is a chronicle of historical essays describing craft used in protest. It mentions most of these calls have been picked up by younger makers which lead me to the research of rug hookers responding. In our 50’s and above, with time but not necessarily mobility to actively protest, we instead use loop pulling to process our anger, document events and leave visual statements for generations to come.

I met three generations who processed Black Lives Matter – Sharon Townsend, Suzanne Cantrell and Maggie Crabb.

Liz Marino has completed several from her fingerprint created as a portrait, suffrage anniversary, BLM and Covid.

Men and women pulled loops in simple geometrics selecting reds to depict the virus, or multi colors haphazardly chosen from the scraps just to be making something during the long hours of lockdown. Our conversations connected us because of the art.

Social media groups are the networking support for established makers and those coming to our crafts because of extra time. Rug Hooking Magazine uses their facebook page for informative events. In lieu of the annual Rug Hooking week at Sauder Village where finalists in Celebrations are exhibited, two webinars provided a gallery talk I lead with judges and personal interviews of many winners conducted by Gene Shephard. These can be viewed by clicking each highlighted link.

We all look toward 2021 and beyond for the opportunities to once again see fiber art in person throughout the world in local communities and museum venues. Normal is a frame of mind and the lessons learned from slowing down this year have been poured into our hooked, punched, prodded and sculpted fiber art. We will continue to virtually share the 19th C crafts using our new 21st C tech skills .

See you in a zoom meeting, at a virtual opening, chatting in a common social group or across a room at the next show. Until then stay safe, healthy and especially CREATING.