Lace
32 x 45 inches
Jacquard tapestry
Cotton
Photo: D. James Dee

 

---

Artist Statement

My recent works focus on aspects of reality that are always within our field of vision but escape attention. Rather than seeking out what I want to see, I try to be aware of what reveals itself to me. My weavings point to the meanings, messages, and traces of human activity recorded on floors, walls, fences, and pavements–surfaces in which these visual cues have become embedded in abstract images of subtle beauty. My drawings and sculptural works engage line and texture in a different way–as intuitive mark making or by using tactile materials to “draw” in three dimensions. At times the sculptures make reference to the forms in my woven images, and sometimes it is the other way around.

Artist Biography

Betty Vera grew up in the Midwest and attended Southern Illinois University before graduating from The Maryland Institute, College of Art in Baltimore with a B.F.A. in Drawing and Painting. She went on to study textile design at the Fashion Institute of Technology and Parsons School of Design in New York. While earning her M.F.A. in Studio Art at Montclair State University, she expanded her studio practice to include sculpture and digital weaving technology. She has studied Jacquard weaving at the Montreal Centre for Contemporary Textiles and at The Jacquard Center in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Her work is in corporate and private collections and has been exhibited widely. It has been featured in American Craft, Fiberarts, Surface Design, Shuttle Spindle & Dyepot, and Interiors magazines, as well as The Fiberarts Design Book; Marypaul Yates’ Fabrics: A Guide for Interior Designers and Architects; and Fiber Art Today, by Carol K. Russell.

A former art book editor, Vera worked as a weaver at the Michelle Lester Studio in New York and also maintained her own studio on Union Square. She has taught at Montclair State University and the Fashion Institute of Technology, and leads intensive workshops at a variety of craft schools, fiber guilds, and conferences.

She has received grants and awards from the Empire State Crafts Alliance, Artists Space, the Ruth Chenven Foundation, and the New York Foundation for the Arts. Artist residencies include the Vermont Studio Center and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.

---