Interview with Bonnie Smith

Karen Musgrave (KM): This is Karen Musgrave and I am doing a Quilters' S.O.S. - Save Our Stories interview with Bonnie Smith. Bonnie is in San Jose, California and I'm in Naperville, Illinois so we are conducting this interview over the telephone. Today's date is December 15, 2008. It is 1:33 in the afternoon, and Bonnie thank you so much for agreeing to do this interview with me. Please tell me about your quilt "Obama in Blue."

Bonnie Smith (BS): First off it is a screen print and I never have done much screen printing, but I thought it was a fast way to get something done, so that is why I decided to use screen print. [laughs.] The "Obama in Blue," it all came about for me--an organization I belong to, a Yahoo group [Quiltart listserve.], Sue Walen came on and said after the election 'I have this piece that I made, wouldn't it be wonderful if we could get together several pieces of fiber art and exhibit somewhere. Is anyone interested?' I even pulled that email just to be sure that what she had said was in that spirit that, 'Let's come together as an artist group and exhibit. . [the exhibition, "President Obama: A Celebration in Art Quilts," will be from February 9 to March 5, 2009 in the main gallery (King Street Gallery) of the Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation Arts Center in Silver Spring, Maryland.] Let's do something, which is what we do in that group.' Someone came back and answered within just within minutes and I pulled her email also to go over it in my mind and she was very upset and abrupt that she thought it was political and the list wasn't for anything political and she wanted it off which struck me strangely that we are artists and this is what we do. We take an event, a feeling, a movement and we run with it and we create from that. So I didn't really understand so I just emailed back Sue and said, 'hey,' three words, 'count me in' and I signed my name. Within twenty-four hours I believe she had the forty, forty-five, maybe even more quilters involved or fiber artists or how people want to address themselves involved in this. Then I had to come up with an idea and so I had to sit and think about that for a minute and then it came to me very fast. I would use the image of his face. I think the man has a beautiful face. As an artist I'm always looking at people's faces. I've done some painting and so I'm always looking closely so I went to a site where I knew I could get a copyright free image and made a copy, handed it to a friend and said, 'Make me a screen print.' It went from there. Blue seemed the natural color. It is a natural muslin background and then the stitching is red, so it is red, white, and blue. It is twenty images. The finished piece is 43 inches wide by 40 inches tall and when I got done every place I show it, everyone who sees it just loves it so I knew I had done the right work. That is really how "Obama in Blue" came about for me. As everyone knows, the Obama Quilters have been picking up more steam. That is how my piece came about.

KM: How do you use this quilt, or how do you plan to use this quilt?

BS: Right now I have a gallery. I live in downtown San Jose and I have a street gallery, my personal gallery and right now it is hanging in my gallery for people on the street to see. I want people to know that I'm proud of what is happening. I'm hoping the exhibit will travel and if the exhibit doesn't travel I will find another place for it to be exhibited. I want the world to see what I made.

KM: Why do you think Obama has inspired so much?

BS: I believe [clears throat.] it is the idea of a new day. I read a lot, follow politics pretty closely and listening to people it is the idea of a new day. You know something fresh, something very intellectual. I was originally a Hillary Clinton supporter and when she didn't get the nod to run for president--my daughter had mentioned to me, 'Oh Mom, you've just got to jump on the Obama bandwagon with us,' and I said, 'Give me some time.' I started listening to his speeches and by the time I listened to a few, some interviews, I thought this is something we haven't had for a while. I felt like it was truth inspiring. People were talking. People who normally don't talk about politics. People I know who were lining up to vote. Registering to vote. Were excited to be voting. Were letting people know that this was going to be the first time that they voted. I think having intelligence. I think just the word hope is very important, hope for our society.

KM: How does this work compare to your normal work? The work you do usually.

BS: I have two. I'm a very flat working artist. My work--I don't deal in depth perception, shadow or that, I deal flat. I want it to be right in your face. I want it to be color. I want it to stop you. Whether you like it or not doesn't matter, but I want to get your attention. If I can just get it for a few seconds, that is what I'm after. If I can get it for even longer than even better. In a way, even though I never worked with screen prints except one other time before and I didn't realize how tricky they are and it is along the same line, straight forward in your face.

KM: Someone looking at this would say, 'Yes, Bonnie Smith made this'?

BS: They might, once they saw the name of the piece they would go, 'Oh yeah, yeah she works straight forward.' If that makes any sense to you because I deal in, even in hand dyed fabrics I want them to be very intense very solid. I don't like that. I don't care for that play in marbling or anything like that in texture like that. I want it to be smooth. I want you to be able to just say I get it. Yeah, I think you could recognize it.

KM: Tell me about your interest in quiltmaking.

BS: I came from a long line of quilters and I'm fortunate enough to have some of their quilts and my family knows that I'm interested in quilts and preserving them and so I have a few, but on my father's side and my mother's side both families quilted and I always admired them, but I always made clothing and I didn't start quilting until about 2000. I was injured in a work accident and at one time I was housebound, chair bound, wheelchair bound so I knew I had to do something so I thought I can not make another pair of slacks or another blouse, where am I going to wear these clothes so I took a quilt class from a local store and that started it, I started making quilts. I fell in love with it. I would stay up at all hours of the night. My husband [Neil.] traveled so a lot of times I would stay up to two or three in the morning just doing what I do. Then we started to purchased a new home and had these big huge walls and like I said a street side gallery and I told my husband we are not buying any new art, I'm making all the art. He said go for it. That is where my interest in fiber arts started. Being able to kind of narrow myself down [clears throat.] and that was the first thought of fiber art. I've always worked in black and I've always worked in solids, but I don't know what it was maybe what happened to me, the injury, everything that happened afterwards. Something within me made it okay to just create what I wanted to create and not worry about anything. I believe when I quilted I maybe used a pattern once or twice. I have trouble following patterns so I always found myself having to create my own patterns and make adjustments and that type of thing. That is how it all sort of got started for me.

KM: Tell me about your street gallery.

BS: Oh I love it. We live in downtown San Jose, we have a two-floor condo and the downstairs is to be used how you want, but it is zoned for business and it has glass doors like you were entering a big department store with glass doors and windows on either side and I looked at Neil and said, 'Can I have this area for myself to put my work in?' He said, 'Well sure.' I love it. When I finish work I can go down and rotate it. It is a vanity gallery. I just recently started inviting people to the gallery dealing with the Obama exhibit trying to get some more information out there about this exhibit. I've started inviting newspapers and telling them where I am. I've had people say, 'Can I come by if your not home?' I tell them, 'Yes.' I've got tons of windows and the sun never comes in so I don't have to worry about it. I can leave all my work up and people love it. It is wonderful when I go into another condo around the corner or somewhere and someone says, 'Oh I saw your work.' Or they will pick out one work that they specifically like. It's kind of a way of exhibiting. I think just making people's day a little better, a little more interesting and out of the norm.

KM: Describe your studio.

BS: My studio is [laughs.] when we lived in our other home my studio, I had a huge kitchen and I worked in the kitchen and we did not eat in the kitchen, I worked in the kitchen, I cooked in the kitchen and then we ate in the family room and Neil had asked me to please when we move to work closer. He likes interacting with me and he hated me being in another room while I was doing my work. So my studio now is in our family room and it is a very large room, it is about I don't know 20 [feet.] by 17 [feet.] and my family has allowed me to have about three quarters of it for my studio and then my family has the TV and their table, you know a little coffee table and chairs where they come and sit and I guess join me while I work in the evenings. I have, like most people several pieces of equipment. I have several machines and my computer and my lights and my books and my fabrics and my, all of my stuff. Pictures up, things that inspire me, great lighting, a good window to work by and a big design wall. It's a very comfortable space for me, very comfortable.

KM: Do you work on more than one thing at a time, or are you a one thing at a time kind of person?

BS: I'm about a three project at a time person. I normally have one large piece that I am working on. Normally the next piece is either on the drawing board and I'm taking notes, doing research about it and then I have something that just comes up that I need to stop in the middle of everything and just do because I feel the need for it. And normally that will be a very small project. I try to limit myself to three because I just can't spread myself out any further than that and get anything of quality finished and get it done within any type of a good timeline.

KM: Tell me about the art and quilt groups you belong to.

BS: I belong to Studio Art Quilt Associates [SAQA.], and I have belonged to them that group since I believe it is 2002, 2003. That is a very inspiring group to belong to. There is just a magnanimous group of people involved in that and a lot of really giving people. I think sometimes I'm lucky I live in San Jose area of California. There is a lot of members here so we can get together and have a lot of meetings. You can do a lot of networking with them and it just sort of exposes you to what is happening in the fiber art world. They are constantly educating us whether it is on learning how to use the computer better. They do interviews. They do pod casts. They try to expose you to what is happening around the world and get you out of your little area. They have meetings across the country every so often, different locations, and another good way to get you out of your area. It is inspiring to belong to such a group of people. I became a professional art member with them, I believe it was in 2006 and that was wonderful to have them judge my work and say, 'We think you are worthy to belong to this group within our group,' and it just sort of elevates your thinking of what you can do. There is no--how do I say? Nothing is narrow. Everything is wide open to them. Any new idea you have sounds great and someone is always there to you know give you a pat on the back and say, 'I think that is a great idea and go forward with it,' or 'Tell me what you've been up to interesting lately.' It is getting that camaraderie. It is very easy when you do fiber art and I think not just fiber art, but for artists in general to get within your little zone and when those meetings come up or you get an email from someone telling you about an open house someone is having or an exhibit someone is involved in, its, you know just get in the car and you go. First because you want to support the group and secondly once you get there then you realize wow, you are seeing something normally just spectacular and again getting to meet and seeing people sometimes you haven't seen in a while. That is the actually only quilt group that I belong to.

I also belong to Women's Caucus for Art which is a national group, about the same size I believe as SAQA. I think they are about 3,000 strong and that is a group of women doing all sorts of art, whether it is monotype painting, sculpture, weaving. Women sometimes doing things I have never even heard of, seeing. They are fascinating whether it is painting and stenciling on glass. I'm just always in awe when I see their work and what some of them have been up to and the ideas they come up with. Those are the two groups that I belong to.

KM: Do you think of yourself as an artist or a quiltmaker or do you even make the distinction?

BS: For a long time I always, I feel like I first started as a quilter because that is what I did, was quilt and then I felt of myself more as a fiber artist but I've evolved. I realize over the last year and a half and I just tell people I'm an artist because I now dabble in photography and painting so why bother to explain all these different areas and just say you're an artist that covers a lot.

KM: What do you think is the biggest challenge confronting art quiltmakers today?

BS: How do you mean that?

KM: Anyway you want to take it.

BS: I think sometimes for quiltmakers it is the idea of people thinking of little old ladies I guess and I don't know. I know some little old ladies that do some pretty dynamic work. I sometimes take offense to that when people say that because I know some ladies who have snow white hair that do some of the most fascinating work I've ever seen so I'm not sure where that comes from and I don't really like it when I hear it , but I've learned to tread pretty lightly on that. I think sometimes it is just being accepted. There are so many great organizations out there that do wonderful exhibits for just traditional quilts and for art quilts and they are growing all the time and I think that helps quilters a lot get acceptance. I think sometimes they don't feel like they have enough acceptance, and fiber arts is pretty much the same way. I think it is something that we are always moving against. I'm always amazed when people who know that I create fiber art and haven't made a big quilt for many years will look at me and say, 'How's that quilting going?' [laughs.] I'm like, 'You realize that I use quilting as my medium to hold everything together that is what it is used for. You realize that don't you?' And normally they will go. 'Oh yes, yes, yes.' I realize sometimes maybe I bring it on myself. Maybe I'm a little too quick to fight back, that maybe I've decided those same people when I run into them I'm going to try something different on them. I'm just going to smile at them and try not to get into that discussion with them. [laughs.]

KM: Save yourself.

BS: Right. [laughs.]

KM: Whose works are you drawn to and why? It doesn't necessarily have to be quiltmakers.

BS: You mean painters?

KM: It can be anybody.

BS: Oh gees now you caught me.

KM: I'm sorry.

BS: That's okay.

KM: It could be a quiltmaker too.

BS: [laughs.] Quilting, I have to tell you I try to stay away from looking at other people's work too much. I think it is very easy for people to be drawn into their work, free to carry their thoughts and ideas and maybe their colors. So as far as painting, Emily Carr. She is a Canadian artist. I just started studying her for a couple of years ago and became fascinated with her boldness of what she was doing. She is from Canada. I'm not sure exactly what they call that area up there, but she was 1920', 1930's. Emily Carr is one of a few women who was getting work out, but still not getting paid or notoriety because she was a woman artist, but that never stopped or slowed her down. She just kept at her craft steadily until she died, but she had such boldness to her work. She liked to paint trees which I'm not a tree person at all, but she adds a depth and to just go into the forest and plant herself for days or weeks on end and do nothing but sketch and sketch and maybe do watercolor and then go back to her humble home and paint and from what I've read it wasn't until actually she died that then the Canadians really gave her the recognition that she deserved. She is one inspiring woman. I love her story. I love how she refused to get married when women were pushed to get married and how she turned down suitors and started a school to teach even children how to create art and just fought against her family just to get inheritance that was coming to her because they really just prefer that she get married and do what she was supposed to do, the woman thing, but she wanted her inheritance and money to study her art. Do what she wanted to do. I think that there is that stubbornness to her that she was creating her art at any cost and if it meant living in a little trailer in the middle of the forest for a while that was okay. She would do what she needed to do and it is very inspiring. You don't run into people today who can give it all up. Jackson Pollack is another one. I guess sometimes from what I've read about Jackson Pollack he created this new, this drip method and I just am very drawn to how tormented he was. I think we are all looking for someone to love us, someone to love our work and I think the saddest thing about him is I think he died and still wasn't sure if people liked him or liked his work. But again he stepped outside the box and did something that no one else was doing and kept at it. Kept at it. You know he traded these little paintings for food. He just kept at it and refused to give up.

KM: How did you come to find Emily Carr?

BS: I had been doing watercolors for a while and I have a mentor that I take everything to, whether it is sewing, painting, whatever, whatever I'm up to and show this person and one day he was looking at the watercolors and he wrote this name down and he said, 'I want you to go get a book on this woman because your work reminds me of hers.' I said, 'Okay,' so I looked at the books. I could not see my work at all. [laughs.] I could not see what I did in this woman's work at all. I'm not sure what he was seeing, but I've been seeing him now for several years and its nice to be able to stop by and show someone what you are working on, the progress, a paper you've written and get a critic on it and know that it is totally unemotional. That is how I came about studying Emily Carr and then the more you learn about her the more you want to know because she is a Canadian national treasure and that they do say now that she is a Canadian national treasure. So finally people realized, finally it is okay to be a woman artist. She hung with several other groups, she had a group of five or six other artists and she was the only woman within the group and even within the group from what I read I don't think she always got positive feedback because she was a woman, but she never gave up. I guess that is what I'm always looking for is somebody who never gives up, is tenacious and just says it in their work I can do this. That's something about myself I realized I have and I realized after studying Pollack and Emily that we have in common that we are tenacious. We are just not going to give up. I've had people say you know maybe you know if you put a little more depth into your work, more shadow or this or that and I look at them this is my work it is flat that is how I see art that is how I see work is flat, so I thought I'm not going to, I'm not going to change my work for anyone. I'm going to follow some examples here of people I think you know who are pretty important.

KM: Tell me more about your mentor. How did you find him?

BS: I found him actually when I was probably at my lowest point when no one was sure if I was ever going to get out of a wheelchair one hundred percent and what was going to happen to me, if I was ever going to be able to walk around a grocery store again and he just came into my life and said, 'You know I think I can give you some help here.' For a long time I thought losing my job, losing my life as I knew it, I just couldn't image ever coming back from that. I had been a stay at home mom giving one hundred percent to children and family and then I was literally counting down on the calendar when I was going to be able to work full time and have benefits, my own 401K, paid vacation. Paid vacation who ever heard of that? That was the big deal. When I lost it all, I just couldn't image what was going to happen. Through fiber art, painting, and doing my work my mentor looked at me one day and said, 'Shall we say that maybe it wasn't such a bad thing? It's all not been for nothing,' and d I remember looking at him and saying, 'We just shall say it and never go there again.' [laughs.] Yeah that is how I happened to meet him, really through my injury or I would never have had time to meet someone like him. Just be sitting somewhere and to meet someone who also has an extensive private art collection so I feel like when they make a comment that they know what they are doing, they travel the globe collecting. That's been that's been a great find for me. It has helped me a lot. He keeps me steady on what I'm doing.

KM: What does your family think of your art?

BS: My family is very supportive. When I was raising my children [daughters Nicole and Shara.], they would get into my scrap books and they would see work that I had painted and drawings that I had done and they would always ask me when I was going to go back and do it again and I would look at them and laugh and say you know it takes time because I am someone who has to have time to be creative. Like I told you my limit three works to really do I believe quality work I have to have a quietness, a silence and they allow me that. They realize it has sort of become my time and they are very supportive. They will do whatever need be. If I'm having problems with getting something on the computer, they will stop what they are doing and help me. If I need to make a trip cross country and I look at my husband and say, 'I really, really need to do this even though it is outside our budget. I need to go there. I feel like I should be there.' He looks at me and says, 'Okay, we will go where you go.' Yeah, they are very supportive. I know I can always depend on them.

KM: That is wonderful. How do you balance your time?

BS: Can you clarify that question?

KM: Well you paint, you do photography, you quilt, you have a family.

BS: What I tell people is I feel like I've gotten selfish, but my husband has pushed me to be more selfish with my time, spend more time on myself and like I say my children are grown now, so I never worry. I know dinner needs to be done at a certain time of the day [laughs.] or if I'm in a huge project my husband will come to the door and I'll be, 'Okay we need to get dinner somewhere,' and he says, 'No problem.' I try to--I don't know how to say, when I'm doing watercolor I would just do watercolor on Sunday afternoons or a day I took class and I would allow myself to have like all day Thursday just for watercolor and then Sunday after 12:00 to maybe 5:00 to just watercolor. It is kind of the same way with photography I allow myself certain time. Fiber art is always present, always in the background, but fiber art can be seven days a week, how many hours a day I want it to be. To go outside the box and do something that I want to or have an interest in I normally have to set a time and I might set a time on. I've been doing a lot of multi-media and Tuesday right now is my day for that, but I can't do too many things at once. Like when I started, I wanted to learn more multi-media I had to drop the watercolor. I just can't spread myself that thin and I don't think it is every going to change. I don't think that part is ever going to develop and that is okay, I've learned to live with that and I realize that if I tried to do fiber art, multi-media, watercolor, and photography all in one day nothing would get done. Maybe fixing dinner that would be the end [laughs.] if that makes any sense.

KM: Um, hum. Do you think that has part to do with aging or not?

BS: No.

KM: Okay, it is just you.

BS: No and yes. One of my children has no short term memory and when she was a child it was a lot to deal with just because for one thing nobody could figure out for years what was wrong with her. They just thought she had dyslexia, but what I realized that as I studied and talked to doctors and would drag the poor child from one place to the other trying to find out what was wrong and how to get help for her that you know all this comes from someone and I believe I have dyslexia and maybe I'm a little you know attention deficit disorder, who knows. I just can't focus and I've been that way forever. When I go back to, when I say the kids would ask me why I wouldn't draw or paint or do something I knew my focus had to be children and family and I knew dinner had to be on the table at a certain time, I knew ballet lessons had to be, you know we had deadlines we had to meet for different functions the children were involved in with their school work, getting up at a certain time and that was just my direction so I realize I've always been like that and didn't realize it. It has just come into focus more now, just I think because I have that history behind me I can look at it. I don't think aging has anything to do with it. Actually I feel like the older I get the more I'm open to new ideas and art and I just have a list of things, more things I want to do, places I want to go. I want six hours more a day is what I want. I want a thirty hour day instead of twenty-four.

KM: What are some things you want to do?

BS: Always.

KM: What are some of the things that you want to do?

BS: I really like to get into photography a lot more, a lot more. I think art is all about seeing and I've realized forever that I could without somebody having to tell me I've always known about composition. I think, I think photography is one of those great forms of art that you can share with a lot of people. A lot of people are very accepting of it. I would like to I would like to travel to Europe. I would like to take some classes with some artists over there. I'm interested in natural dyeing and I know that they have a lot of natural dyeing classes over there, that is like the hubbub for natural dying, fabric dyeing, fiber dying. I also collect Irish linen and I know from having gone to Europe to purchase linen that they are just so advanced on this type of craft, linen, weaving, things like this. That is where it started. They have been doing it for eons. What is it, someone told me once you keep going over and buying linens, one day there will be no linens left in the UK [United Kingdom.] and I say, 'You don't understand. They are still crocheting lace over there every day.' They are just doing wonderful crafts and the government supports it. That is another big thing, our government doesn't support us in our craft, but their government does. There is a lot more things I want to learn.

KM: Good. Do you have any plans to make anymore Obama art?

BS: I have a second one. [laughs.]

KM: Tell me about it.

BS: It again is a screen print and it is just different. Unfortunately I'm one of those one note people. I don't know how much further I will go. Every once in a while something comes up in my mind, but I did make another one. The problem right now is that I have so many big projects going on that I have timelines so maybe when those are done. I have a different screen print of him, that I Would like to work with.

KM: Is it a head again?

BS: Yes. [laughs.]

KM: How do you want to be remembered?

BS: I want to be remembered as someone who cared. Cared about our family, cared about art, cared about the world in general. [Someone who left a footprint.] That is how I would like to be remembered.

KM: We are almost near the end, is there anything else you would like to share that I haven't asked you?

BS: No I think you have covered an amazing amount of territory.

KM: I think you do an excellent job.

BS: Thank you. [laughs.]

KM: I guess we will conclude our interview at 2:14.