Three upcoming events starting next Tuesday offer you the chance to participate in the art of felt-making with an artist of international renown – who happens to live in Olympia.
Join textile artist Janice Arnold and her team from noon to 5 p.m. next Tuesday, July 18, and/or Thursday, July 20, also from noon to 5 p.m., for a firsthand tactile and visual experience with wool fiber as it becomes a community art project. Watch videos made in Central Asia – shown on a massive felted projection screen, of course -- showing the processes as done there and now here.
Themed ”Making Social Fabric: Building Community with Felt,” the series is part of the city’s “Armory Arts Intervention” programs at the Olympia Armory Creative Campus. The first two sessions will be “hands-on interactive and visual experiences centered around wool and felt,” according to the open invitation.
The final event is the Community Stomp! & Felt Dance Party, Saturday, July 22 from 4 to 8 p.m. Attendees will walk (or stomp) on huge wool layups saturated with warm water to compress and agitate the fibers into felt before having the dance music by Bruce Whitney at 6 p.m. when the fabric becomes enmeshed to a more robust material.
“There will be activities for all ages,” Arnold told The JOLT, adding that “willingness to ask questions, get involved and learn about felt” is all anyone needs to participate.
Aside from the Felt & Fiber Lab and Forms of Felt Art pop-ups, participants will learn to decode the ancient felt material through science, art, and participatory learning.
It will be Olympia’s first party of this kind. Attendees may bring a lawn chair and must be prepared to get a little wet for the collaborative, step-by-step process of making felt.
In its current issue, Smithsonian magazine described Arnold as “devoted to the study of wool fiber and the felting process since she made her first felt in 1999.”
Arnold is also said to have “led a nomadic life of the 21st-century artist” because of her comprehensive travel in Mongolia, Nepal, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Turkey, among other places.
During an interview with TextileArtist.org published on her website, Arnold expressed her fascination with the craft, saying there is no tool between the hand and the raw fiber.
“When I first witnessed felt making, it seemed a strange form of magic. Featherweight tufts of raw wool combined with time and hard work created a dense, strong-textured material with a natural edge, unlike anything I had ever seen!” Arnold recounted.
Arnold has a piece of advice for budding textile artists, emphasizing that studying quality comes first before seeking refinement.
“They should focus first on learning the inherent properties, quality, and beauty of their craft before imposing design into it. Every artist—new or not—needs to learn to step back and look at their work from a distance and with a critical eye. Consider how it could be improved and seek perfection,” Arnold said.
Arnold works at her studio near Centralia, which boasts a wall full of different types and colors of wool, which she uses in making felt art.
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