Alegre Retreat 2021 (2020 Do-Over) Teachers
Katie Pasquini Masopust is our master of ceremonies and has gone to great lengths to line up a fabulous team of instructors who will offer a rich variety of courses for the 2021 (2020 Do-Over) Alegre Retreat.
Jacquie Gering: Jacquie is a passionate modern quilt designer, maker and teacher. She is known for her innovative designs, striking message quilts and unique style. Jacquie co-authored Quilting Modern: Techniques and Projects for Improvisational Quilts and her book, Walk: Master Machine Quilting With Your Walking Foot is a comprehensive guide to all things walking foot quilting.
She is a leader in and advocate for the modern quilting movement. The International Association of Creative Arts Professionals named her Quilt Teacher of the Year for 2014. She lives in Kansas City with her husband Steve and her dog Sideways, and shares her quilting knowledge on her popular blog, Tallgrass Prairie Studio.
www.tallgrassprairiestudio.blogspot.com
Joe Cunningham: Joe has been a professional quilt artist since 1979. He has written essays on the subject for museum catalogues, books and magazines. His book, Men and the Art of Quiltmaking was the first book on its subject. In 2004 he received a $30,000 Shulte Grant from the Fort Mason Foundation. In 2009 he received a grant to study with the Gees Bend quilters in Alabama. In 2010 he was artist in residence at the De Young Museum in San Francisco, which purchased one of his quilts for its permanent collection. Joe travels throughout the country to give lectures and workshops on quiltmaking. His ten books on quiltmaking include the first biography of a living quilter, the first book on men who make quilts (Men and the Art of Quiltmaking,) and a definitive book on marking quilts for quilting called Quilting with Style, published by AQS. He has been seen on the Peabody Award-winning PBS series Craft in America, the HGTV series “Simply Quilts with Alex Anderson,” as well as “The Quilt Show” with Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson, and others. Cunningham has performed his musical quilt show, “Joe the Quilter,” for guilds and theaters nationwide. His latest book is “Man Made Quilts: Civil War to the Present,” a catalogue for the show of the same name at the Shelburne Museum. His quilts are in the permanent collections of the DeYoung museum, The Shelburne Museum, The Newark Museum, The San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles and many private collections.
He has been invited to give lectures in museums and colleges including the DeYoung Museum, University of Michigan, the Chicago Art Institute, the Shelburne Museum, and the International Quilt Study Center and Museum, The National Quilt Museum and the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles.
Joe began making quilts in his hometown of Flint, Michigan. He eventually moved to San Francisco where he maintains a gallery/studio to make and show his quilts. He lives with his wife, Carol LeMaitre, above her Pilates studio, Sanchez Street Studios. Their two sons live nearby. Cunningham travels the world to show quilts and teach as well as teaching his popular online classes from his studio.
http://www.joecunninghamquilts.com/
Laura Wasilowski is a textile artist and creator of hand-dyed fabrics and threads. Her pictorial art quilts (created from fused fabrics and hand-embroidered or machine quilted) are collected and exhibited internationally. Wasilowski’s free-form embroideries share a similar style with her narrative quilts. Whimsical in nature, both textile art forms express her joy and love of creating art.
Owner of the dye shop, Artfabrik, Laura is also a lecturer, surface designer, quilt instructor, pattern designer, and author of Fusing Fun, Fuse-and-Tell, Fanciful Stitches, Colorful Quilts, and her latest book Joyful Stitching: Transform Fabric with Improvisational Embroidery.
Artist Statement: I combine vivid fabrics and whimsical stories to make pictorial art quilts. My colorful, hand-dyed fabrics inspire me, as do stories of my family, friends, and home. These pieces often chronicle my life. Each wall piece I make is of my own design, of fused appliqué, and machine quilted. Creating with fused fabric allows my work to be joyful, organic, and more inventive. It is the most direct route from a design idea in my head to the realization of that idea in fabric.
The art of quilting gives me the freedom to express myself and play at the same time. It’s the best job in the world!
For nearly 30 years Katie Pasquini Masopust has produced high quality contemporary art quilts that have been coveted and collected by a broad range of admirers. From her early beginnings as a painter dabbling in traditional quilt making, her work has evolved from structured Mandalas and mind-blowing dimensional pieces to very painterly landscapes and abstracts executed with the finest fabrics and most creative stitching techniques. Katie’s easy, energetic manner has made her a very popular teacher and lecturer.
When not in residence at her studio in Fortuna, CA she travels the world presenting her contemporary quilting theories and techniques to classes; not only in North America, but in Europe, the Far East, Australia and New Zealand. Awards and accolades have been numerous for Katie, culminating with her 2005 induction into a very select group of art quilt professionals who have earned the Silver Star Award presented by Houston Quilt Festival.
A prolific author, Katie shares her enthusiasm for the art of creative quilting through her numerous books, her many classes, and now as a member of the Experius Academy Advisory Council as they work to develop the art mission for the new Gateway Canyons Resort in Colorado.