Teresa Shelton Designs – A Journey Down the Rabbit Hole
Teresa Shelton Designs – A Journey Down the Rabbit Hole
Presentation Content: The presentation will cover my initial foray into beadweaving in the 90s at a small bead store in Cotati, CA (Out on a Whim Beads) and the subsequent journey that followed. Spanning over three decades of beadweaving, so far, my beading journey has taken me from buying books (pre-internet) to learn the basic techniques, developing my own unique style, selling my beaded jewelry & sculptures, and creating patterns out of necessity to applying for art calls and showing my beadwork at art galleries around the world. My inspiration and goals have shifted over the years from a simple craft form to being passionate about presenting beadweaving as a fine-craft and an art form. I will also, briefly, cover the basics of submitting for an art call and share some resources for finding art calls.
At my core, I am a maker and an explorer, preferring to openly explore and listen to the beads, rather than to set out, with intention, to make a new design and write a pattern for it. As a beadweaving explorer, I routinely ask the question “what if” and then after creating something I like, sometimes I then need to ask the question, “Can I reproduce it?” I will show some examples in the presentation of pieces that were created from freely exploring this way.
Speaker Bio:
By integrating mathematics and physics principles with tiny seed beads, I create sculptural and wearable art. With every stitched bead, I incorporate structure, form, movement, and color into my artwork to achieve bold statement pieces with unexpected surprises.
I grew up as a military brat, bouncing from coast to coast. In the 90’s, I wandered into a local bead shop and bought a book on Native American beadweaving techniques and a few tubes of mixed seed beads. That was enough to start my love of beadweaving. Although I’ve tried other art mediums over the years, I returned to off-loom seed beadweaving. I currently live in the forested hills and canyons of North Central Idaho with my husband, some chickens, and a demanding feline overlord.
A pivotal moment in my journey as an artist was a rejection from a juried art show about ten years ago. The feedback was that I lacked a unique, distinguishable style and my work was too similar to other bead artists. These valuable comments prompted me to stop beading from other designers’ patterns and develop my own designs to create the now-distinct look of Teresa Shelton Designs. My occupation as a printed circuit board manufacturability engineer inspires the geometric style in my art and allows me to easily merge the technical with the creative.
To distinguish my work from other geometric beadweaving artists, I use “round” seed beads instead of the precision cylinder beads most other geometric beadweaving artists use. I prefer to use round seed beads to give a softer, more organic look to the otherwise hard geometric angles. To build visual interest, I stitch unique features in my work, such as one pattern or one element, that intentionally stand out from the rest of the piece. These highlights often act as a focal point, but other details are more subtle, almost hidden.
Inspiration for my art arrives in a myriad of ways: translated from another medium, in nature, through charted data, or from an enticing color scheme. A great motivator for me to discover new designs is to ask the question, “what if?” and then fearlessly explore it. I refer to these creative adventures, with a nod to writer Lewis Carroll, as “follow the rabbit down the hole”. Sometimes things turn out as I have envisioned them, but more often than not, I surprise myself with what structures and shapes emerge in my hands
Visit Teresa on the web at: https://teresashelton.com/
DATE: Tuesday, March 15, 2027, 6:50-8:30pm via zoom Meeting, the meeting will opn at 6:50 and the presentation will begin promptly at 7pm Pacific.
COST: Free to members; $5.00 for non-members or purchase an annual membership for $25.
Payment for Non-Members ($5.00):
To prepare, please go to https://zoom.us/ and follow the directions to access Zoom®. Sadly, BSNC can not provide tech support.
Please RSVP to judysinclair@beadsocietyofnorcal.org. She will send out the Zoom meeting information prior to each class/speaker event and follow up with a reminder email. Spaces are limited, so please RSVP early.
