Rebecca Mezoff’s Tapestry Workshop: Variety was the Theme

I love weaving workshops where each student is creating something different–it’s so instructional to see a smorgasbord of technique and color.  At Rebecca Mezoff’s tapestry workshop on color gradation, held at the Weavers Guild of Minnesota this weekend, even the looms were of a great variety.   Many worked well; some less so. But it was ALL SO INTERESTING.  The workshop went very well; the students were all challenged and we learned a ton from Rebecca and the experiences of other students.  Rebecca seemed to enjoy herself too, and she loved the Weavers Guild and Textile Center.  More than once she said that we should really appreciate what a wonderful resource we have here in Minnesota.  (We do.)  We received praise as organized and diligent students who came with good weaving background.  Apparently that is not always the case in her workshops!

Michelle Greenhouse used a simple wooden frame with no shedding device, and managed very well.  She was also the newest tapestry weaver.  Even though she had only a few hours of instruction before the workshop, her teacher was Traudi Bestler, so those hours were a fabulous beginning.  Michelle particularly enjoyed making the color transitions with weft bundling.

Zoe Eckblad wove on a simple frame, too.  Here she is just beginning a transparency experiment, where part of the teardrop shape intersects with the circle beside it.  The smaller shape created by the overlap was about the be woven with yarns that make it look like a combination of the two larger shapes.

Claire Most brought a Louet table loom and had a great experience; it had tight tension and a wide-open shed.  Rebecca was surprised that the table loom worked so well.

This was Claire’s favorite part of her samples; mine too!  I loved the use of hatching to create shapes.

Francie Iverson used a tapestry loom given to her by someone else because it didn’t work well.  Francie concurred!  She challenged herself by weaving from the back for the first time.

There was a Mirrix side of the table, three weavers quite happy with their looms.    Here are Kazuko Stone and Carol Harrington.  The Mirrix people also happened to be students in Rebecca’s online tapestry classes.

Dawn Macfall was a double-barreled Mirrix weaver, with two looms.  I think she also won the prize for most time put in at the loom during the workshop, weaving in her hotel room each evening.

Traudi Bestler made wonderful shapes with hatching on her copper pipe loom.  At the end of the workshop she was planning a tapestry of swirling fish in water with bubbles; I’m very eager to see that tapestry finished.

Kristin Majkrzak from Bemidji worked with different aspects of color gradations within one image on her copper pipe loom.

During the weekend people would stop by her loom and come up with their own ideas of what the evolving shape resembled.  A fish, a bathing suit, a vase! What do you think? I needed to look at it several times, because I couldn’t get enough of the striking combination of orange and pink yarn, so beautifully blended.

Janet Johnson was the only person without a portable tapestry loom.  She really enjoyed weaving on one of the Guild Baby Wolf looms.  I asked her if she was planning on buying a tapestry loom now, and she said probably not, her floor loom would work fine.

Jan is an experienced floor loom weaver and instructor, now trying her hand at tapestry. Here she is working with color transitions.

The only loom missing from this account is mine, a beautiful vintage Glimåkra tapestry loom, which I bought second-hand and warped for the first time for this workshop.  More about that soon!