Posts in Session 1
Ready for Whatever
Ready for Whatever

This beginner’s workshop will focus on traditional and innovative ways to form hot steel. Emphasis will be on teaching skills required to express unique ideas and create well-crafted work in iron. Participants will learn tapering, upsetting, bending, spreading, forge welding, and inflating and welding with an Oxygen Acetylene torch will be taught. All levels welcome.

Elizabeth Brim (she/her) is an artist who uses traditional blacksmithing techniques and innovative metalworking techniques to make sculptures.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganBlacksmithing, Elizabeth Brim
Narrative + Ceramics: Thinking through Making
Narrative + Ceramics: Thinking through Making

In this workshop, we will primarily work with clay, but each day will also incorporate small exercises in creative narrative building and imagery generation on paper. Our goal is to explore the possibilities of the intersection of ceramics and comics, allowing you to imagine concepts from one medium and bring your ideas to life in the other. Throughout the workshop, we will think of narrative in the broadest of terms—starting with a simple idea and then transitioning it in incremental steps to expand it into new directions. Participants will consider a wide range of options for combining ceramics and storytelling, from creating simple wall tiles to constructing dynamic comic characters as sculptures in clay. Prior experience in ceramics required, along with a willingness to explore and experiment, without the need for mastery, and a desire to express your vision of personal observations of life around you through creative messaging, narrative, and imagery.

Kevin Snipes (he/him) is a Maker and Thinker—an American artist known for his ceramic work that blurs the boundaries between craft and art.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganCeramics, Kevin Snipes
Brokenness: The Craft of Garment Repair + Alteration
Brokenness: The Craft of Garment Repair + Alteration

While no two repairs are alike, similar skills can be applied to various garment and fabric types. Plan to bring a suitcase filled with clothing and textiles in need of care, and learn to assess and execute the hand- or machine-based repair techniques that will keep woven and knitted garments in circulation. This workshop will cover repair, fit, and alterations—reclaiming clothing we love despite a fashion industry that often doesn’t love us back. A basic understanding of sewing machine use will be helpful. All levels welcome.

Alaska artist Amy Meissner (she/her)combines handwork, found objects, and abandoned textiles to reference literal, physical, and emotional labor. She teaches the craft of repair as an act of prolonging, care, and accompaniment of vulnerable objects in transition.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganFiber, Amy Meissner
Monotype Alchemy
Monotype Alchemy

The process of creating monotypes is rich with experimentation and play! In this workshop, we will delve into the spontaneous, inventive, and expansive medium of monotype printmaking using nontoxic inks. Participants will explore both additive and subtractive printmaking processes, stencils, and masking with cut paper and organic materials, chine collé, and multiple color and ghost printing. Through daily demonstrations and projects, participants will discover the experiment and develop a visual dialogue, and leave with a collection of prints. No printmaking experience needed. All levels welcome.

Jennifer Koch’s (she/her) art-making practice, which considers themes of collecting, sorting, the natural world, and repetition includes printmaking, object-based sculptures, and collage.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganGraphics, Jennifer Koch
Second Skin: Leather Jewelry Wearables
Second Skin: Leather Jewelry Wearables

For millennia, humans have supplemented the body by constructing wearable implements that aim to repair, bolster, or enhance the body. Participants will design and construct a new body part, extension, prosthesis, or wearable volume using leather forming and metal fabrication techniques. Through digital fabrication, traditional mold-making, and custom “buck” creation, participants will shape unique leather forms. Basic metalworking, cold connections, and leather-working will be taught as participants create a frame or apparatus to integrate their creations with the body. All levels welcome.

Kerianne Quick (they/she), a nationally recognized jewelry artist and Associate Professor at San Diego State University, creates work exploring migration and the role of objects in memory, with pieces featured in major collections like LACMA and MFA Houston.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganMetals, Kerianne Quick
Sitting with the Past: Craft + Culture Through Chair Making
Sitting with the Past: Craft + Culture Through Chair Making

This workshop will offer participants a deep dive into a variety of tools and techniques for the design and construction of ladderback chairs. Parts will be split from a freshly felled log, shaped using drawknives and spokeshaves, and joined through a combination of traditional and modern techniques. Demonstrations will be based on the iconic form produced by the Poynor family, and participants will be encouraged to experiment with their own design ideas with their chairs. All levels welcome.

Charlie Ryland (he/him) is a chair maker and teacher interested in working with pre-industrial tools, techniques, and styles to unpack their stories and adapt their forms to the modern context.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganWood, Charlie Ryland
The Storied Object: Narrative Complexities in Crafted Works
The Storied Object: Narrative Complexities in Crafted Works

During Nehal El-Hadi’s residency, she will continue research, reflection, and writing on topics that consider the following: Crafted objects contain histories, geographies, temporalities, and meanings inherent in their existence. Narrative complexity is the ability to tell stories that provide historicity, highlight connections, convey context, and suggest implications—it is both understanding and a communication, and requires an engagement with the object that acknowledges and elicits multiple knowledges, contends with various chronographies and futurities, complicates space, site, location, and scale, and accounts for paradoxes, counterintuitions, and inherent tensions.

Nehal El-Hadi (she/her) is the Editor-in-Chief of STUDIO Magazine, a biannual publication dedicated to contemporary Canadian craft and design.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganVisiting Artist, Nehal El-Hadi
Materials Library
Materials Library

Materials are fundamental to craft. Accordingly, the goal of Fiona Bell’s residency is to develop a Materials Library at Haystack that can be built upon in the future. The collection will be organized by material type and cataloged to provide information regarding composition, properties, methods, and potential applications. Existing materials will include manufacturer information while do-it-yourself materials will be accompanied by recipes. By building this collection, others at Haystack can learn more about materials and add new materials to the Library.

Fiona Bell (she/her) is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Computer Science at the University of New Mexico, developing sustainable biomaterials at the intersection of material science, biodesign, and human-computer interaction.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganFab Lab Resident, Fiona Bell
Weaving in Nature
Weaving in Nature

During her residency, Kate Reed will share her work and discuss the properties of fibers, shapes, and forms that we encounter in nature. This work is intended to foster reflection on the intersection of art and nature, weaving together conversation, craft, and exploration in the great outdoors. As part of the residency, Reed will offer an immersive hike for session participants, during which they will gather natural materials to create woven pieces, exploring the structures and textures found in the environment.

Kate Reed (she/her) specializes in building machines, modifying biology, augmenting the body, and growing technology to build wearable technology that connects humans and computers with the natural world.

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Session 1Molly FlaniganFab Lab Resident, Kate Reed