Dorothy Apkene Amenuke is a fiber artist who studied at the Kwame Nkrumah University in Kumasi, Ghana, where she is currently teaching in the sculpture department. She has been an artist in residence at: Art Omi International, Apexart, Artist’s Workshop Kuona Trust in Kenya, and Dwayer’s International Women Artists’ Workshop in Egypt. She has participated in Artist to Artist: Multicultural Voices at the Perpich Center for Arts Education in Minnesota. Amenuke exhibits her batik fabrics and fiber sculpture internationally. She maintains a studio in Pakoso, Ghana, where she lives with her family.

“My work is fabric based, exploring its communicative potentials and speaking to that which is intimate and personal and often relating to the body. Fabric and cloth is an essential part of the Ghanaian life and experience. In my work with the art of batik fabric dyeing, I bring a personal voice – my musing – to the cloth. I am extending the tradition of batik pattern and color to produce a personal language of both regulated and spontaneous design.” Dorothy Apenke Amenuke

Susan Amons has a degree in painting from Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. Susan exhibits regularly and is represented by Cheryl Pelavin, NY, and Mast Cove Gallery, ME. Her work is included in public collections of the Portland Museum of Art, Farnsworth Art Museum, New York and Boston Public Libraries, the Zimmerli Collection at Rutgers, NJ, and in the museums of Bowdoin, Colby, and Bates College, in Maine.

Eugenie Barron was drawn to handmade paper in 1976, primarily due to an interest in watercolor. In 1978 she apprenticed with Douglass Morse Howell and assisted him in his later years with his research into raw flax fiber. In the early 1980’s she acquired the equipment for her own studio in order to develop the artistic potential of papermaking. She has taught, written and curated nationally. Her particular interest in the drying and shrinkage of paper informs her sculptural pursuits.

Amelia Bird has an MFA in Nonfiction Writing and a Certificate in Book Arts from the University of Iowa. She has taught writing and printing at the University of Iowa Center for the Book, Hocking College, Marietta College and the New College of Florida.

Barbara Leoff Burge is an active artist and co-founder of WSW. She studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and has exhibited her work across the U.S. Teaching in tandem with artmaking is Barbara’s passion, as many of her longtime students will attest. She engages them with enthusiasm and generosity.

Ruth McKinney Burket is the new WSW clay program coordinator and a recent MFA graduate from SUNY New Paltz where she continues to teach as an adjunct professor. She grew up in Spain and was the manager of Brick City Center for the Arts in Ocala FL for several years before moving to the Hudson Valley. She enjoys the variety and depth of techniques available within the field of ceramics and loves finding ways for students to realize their creative visions.

Melissa Jay Craig’shandmade paper book works, sculptures and installation works are exhibited internationally.  She is also a curator, writer and an award-winning educator.  She was instrumental in creating the interdisciplinary book and paper MFA program at Columbia College, Chicago.  She is a frequent lecturer and teacher at schools and arts centers throughout the U.S.  Melissa has been awarded numerous grants and residencies. She lives and works in Chicago.

Tatiana Ginsberg is an artist, dyer, and papermaker who studied at the University of Iowa Center for the Book before spending two years in Japan on a Fulbright research grant investigating traditional naturally dyed Japanese papers. Studying at one of the oldest dye studios in Kyoto, she learned the art of dyeing paper in brilliant colors for temple festivals, sutra copying, and other uses. Currently she teaches as a visiting artist at Mount Holyoke College. Her own work integrates traditional skills with contemporary techniques and is exhibited nationally and internationally.

Ann Kalmbach is a founder and the Executive Director of Women's Studio Workshop. Ann is WSW's screenprint guru. She holds an MFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology, where she studied in both the textile and printmaking departments.  She has been awarded residencies at Visual Studies Workshop, University of Southern Maine, and the MacDowell Colony. Last September, Ann and Tana Kellner (KaKeART) were artists-in-residence at a Sirius Art Center in County Cork Ireland. 

Kelly McGrath earned a BFA in Sculpture from SUNY New Paltz in 2007. Her experiences include an internship at Women's Studio Workshop and work as a studio assistant for artists Devorah Sperber, Talya Baharal and Carmen Lizardo. An emerging artist, her work was featured in the 2009 Kingston Sculpture Biennial, and she has completed several mural commissions. Kelly enjoys working with other artists to creatively problem solve integrating sculptural methods into their practice.

Susan Mills is an artist and bookbinder.  She is on the faculty of Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and is a 2012 visiting instructor at Pratt Institute.  She is the founder of Full Tilt Bookbinding www.bookbindingclasses.blogspot.com/ and hosts Bookbinding Now biweekly audio podcasts www.bookbindingnow.com. Her artist books can be seen at www.susanmillsartistbooks.com.

Catherine Nash, long time resident of Tucson, is an artist who freely mixes media in her work to express ideas.  Specializing in hand papermaking, encaustic painting and mixed media drawing, Catherine is a teaching artist who balances her studio work with school based artists’ residencies.  She has lectured and taught advanced workshops in sculptural artists’ books, Western and Japanese sheet forming and encaustic across the United States, as well as in professional studios/universities in Europe, Australia, and Japan.

Susan Hover Oehme is the owner and Master Printer of Oehme Graphics in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, which she founded in 2010, culminating a career spanning 25 years as a Master Printer at Riverhouse Editions, Tyler Graphics and numerous other fine print studios in New York City. She has collaborated with more than 50 artists, including John Walker, Louise Fishman, Joan Mitchell, David Row, and Mia Westerlund Roosen, and has taught these methods at Riverhouse Editions, University of Denver, Northwestern University, and Brandeis University as well as at WSW.

Kristina Paabus was born and raised in Massachusetts and has also called, Providence, Minneapolis, Chicago, Tallinn, Estonia home.  She studied Fine Arts and Religious Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Fine and Applied Arts at The Estonian Academy of Arts (EAA), and received a BFA and Art History Concentration from the Rhode Island School of Design.  In 2009 she earned her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) and then moved to Tallinn as a Fulbright Fellow and visiting artist at the EAA.  Kristina has taken part in residencies in the U.S., Iceland, Estonia, and Romania, and has exhibited her work in Chicago, Boston, Minneapolis, Rosendale, Providence, Reykjavik, Berlin, and Tallinn.  Currently, Kristina lives and works in Chicago where she is a faculty member and Graduate Coordinator in SAIC’s Department of Printmedia.

Cal Patch is a clothing designer who has worked for several big names in the fashion industry, developed her own line of ‘one of a kind’ handmade pieces, owned a boutique in Manhattan, and opened one of the first indie craft schools. She has been teaching fiber arts for the past ten years. After seventeen years of designing clothes in New York City, Cal has recently relocated to a farm in the Catskills where she continues to make clothes. Her book on drafting sewing patterns, Design-It-Yourself Clothes, was published in 2009. Currently she sells her work at craft fairs and online in her Etsy shop. You can see what she's up to at hodgepodgefarm.net

Roxanne Faber Savage is a multidisciplinary artist, and works in printmaking as her primary medium. She studied drawing and art education at Boston University, Pratt Institute (BFA drawing), and Queens College (M.S. Ed.).  Her work has been featured in solo and invitational exhibitions, including The National Arts Club, New York Editions/Book Fair, 440 Gallery, The Center for Contemporary Printmaking, The Housatonic Museum of Art, The Sacred Heart Gallery of Contemporary Art, and ARTSPACE in New Haven.

Shelley Thorstensen teaches printmaking and drawing at Tyler School of Art and is currently the president of the Society of American Graphic Artists (SAGA), the oldest juried member printmaker organization in the United States, based in New York City (100 years old in 2015). Recent solo shows include This is the Smoke from when the Horses Left (Painted Bride Art Center, Philadelphia PA in 2011), Counterpoint – The Leap from Vision to Print (Woodmere Art Museum, Chestnut Hill PA in 2010), The Preponderance of Evidence (The Print Center, Philadelphia PA in 2009). She has an undergraduate degree in Experimental Studies from Syracuse University School of Visual & Performing Arts, Syracuse NY, and a graduate degree in Printmaking from the Tyler School of Art /Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. Her work can be seen at Dolan/Maxwell in Philadelphia PA (dolanmaxwell.com) and PrintmakersOpenForum.org

Patty Tyrol is an artist and art teacher who received her BFA and MA in printmaking from SUNY New Paltz. She has been printing and showing her work for more than 30 years. She was artist-in-residence at Cape Cod National Seashore last summer where she documented the movement of the sun and tide in cyanotype.

Abigail Uhteg first came to WSW for an artist’s book residency in 2009, and has returned every year since to teach at the Summer Arts Institute. Prior to this she worked for two years as a book conservator at Columbia University and Paper Dragon Books, both in New York City, and before that was the associate coordinator of Dolphin Print & Press at the Maryland Institute College of Art. She is currently working on an MA in book conservation at West Dean College in England, and regularly contributes bookbinding advice to the WSW blog.

Pamela J. Wallace, sculptor and installation artist, works in diverse materials such as metal, fabric, plaster, concrete, paper, and resin. She creates organic forms in dialogue with layered grids and varied surfaces, constructing works reminiscent of the effects of natural processes on decaying industrial spaces. She received her MFA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale in Sculpture and in Blacksmithing. Represented by The John Davis Gallery, Hudson, NY, where she recently had a solo show, and was awarded a NYFA Special Opportunity Stipend grant for her installation, “Suspended so far, yet somewhere else”, which she created in the gallery’s 28’ tall installation space in a freight elevator shaft way.

Cynthia Winika is a mixed media artist who shows her work in the US and abroad. She is a National member of A.I.R. Gallery, NYC. Cynthia is the Encaustic Workshop Director/teacher for R&F Handmade Paints and has been a visiting artist/lecturer at Yale University, Oregon College of Arts and Crafts, San Francisco Art Institute, Columbia College Chicago, and the Montclair Art Museum. Her paintings and technical advice on encaustic are featured in: Collage for the Soul by Paula Grasdal, and The Art of Encaustic Painting: Contemporary Expression in the Ancient Medium of Pigmented Wax by Joanne Mattera.