Carol Krueger

Carol Krueger

BOQ-029

Carol Krueger

Karen Musgrave

02/04/2009

The National Quilting Association

Louisville, Colorado

Kim Greene

Karen Musgrave (KM): This is Karen Musgrave and I'm conducting a Quilters' S.O.S. - Save Our Stories interview with Carol Krueger. Carol is in Louisville, Colorado and I am in Naperville, Illinois so we are conducting this interview over the telephone. Today's date is February 4, 2009. It is now 11:38 in the morning. Carol thank you so much for taking time out of your day to do this interview with me.

Carol Krueger (CK): Thank you for having me.

KM: Please tell me about your quilt "That Won."

CK: The title of my quilt "That Won" and it is spelled w-o-n came from one of the last debates that Senator [Barack.] Obama did with Senator [John.] McCain. It was one of the debates in the town hall style where the candidates were allowed to freely move around the stage and so on. It became a somewhat memorable debate I think for a lot of people because they felt that it was a turning point, not a good turning point for Senator McCain. At one point during the debate, he kept referring to Senator Obama as 'that one' as if Obama was an inanimate object, instead of saying 'that person' or 'that senator.' It was very impersonal and a lot of people I think felt that it was rather rude but in my own twisted sense of humor I saw in my mind's eye the words 'that won,' w-o-n, and in a sense I really believed from that moment on that Senator Obama was going to win the election. The rude comment made Senator McCain look somewhat defeated and I think just in general as a personal statement when you are running against another person, when you lose your cool and you lose your self-respect and you lose your respect for the opponent it makes you look somehow defeated. I really felt that this was the main taking off point for this piece. I wanted to put 'that won' on the quilt as a statement. The title appears on the piece. I made what is almost like a campaign button. It is a monogrammed round shape that is actually pinned to the piece. It is not permanently affixed. It appears on the lower left hand corner of the piece, like how someone would put on a campaign button. It has a pin on the back and it can be removed at a later date if someone wanted to remove it but that is my title and I felt that it really needed to be part of the piece.

KM: What techniques did you use to make it?

CK: My piece is quite a bit different than the other quilted pieces in the show in that the piece is almost entirely beaded. It's comprised of approximately fourteen thousand Japanese glass seed beads, size 11 in case anybody wants to know. People always ask me these technical things so I like to say that. The piece took a number of hours to make. It takes approximately an hour to an hour and a half per square inch to make this type of hand beaded piece. It is quite a meticulous and laborious kind of a technique. It is not difficult. It is just extremely time consuming. I bordered the piece with a piece of cotton welt that looks a bit like Kente cloth as reflection of President Obama's background, his heritage, and just a very simple black frame because I didn't want to detract too much from this intricate beading technique. A lot of people ask me about this beading technique. One of the most common questions that I get is, 'Where do you begin the piece?' I always begin the piece in the same place. I begin with the iris of the eye. They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul so that is where I begin. I always try to get the expression in the eyes first. If I'm not pleased with how the eyes look, then I've been known to tear out the beading and rework it or try to get it to just the expression that I want. I start with the eye and then I keep working my way out around until the face is pretty well completed. I usually work the background area last on the piece. In this case, the background of my original photo was very plain and I decided to [clears throat.] to bead in a ray of hope. There is an orange band that comes down and illuminates the president's face. I wanted that to be symbolic of the ray of hope that was the cornerstone of the message that Obama gave during his election. The word 'Hope' was his central message. I wanted to try to put that into the piece in a symbolic manner and that's what that orange band is coming down to the top of his face and how it kind of illuminates the face. The technique is very, as I mentioned before is rather time consuming and it takes a lot of commitment to do that. The piece itself, the quilt is about 15 [inches.] by 18 [inches.]. The actual beaded area of the quilt is only about 8 [inches.] by 11 [inches.], 8 [inches.] by 12 [inches.], something like that. It's not a very large area but it took approximately eighty hours to complete the beading. Let's see, in regards to the technique I also like to try to pay attention to the direction of the beading. At close observation you can see that some of the areas of the beading have a different directional quality. Like this ray that comes down from the sky of course that is pretty self explanatory. You can see that the beads are in a linear fashion that come down from the top to the bottom. I really had fun working some of the areas. Like if you observe his hair I worked it in a lot of these small sort of crisscross areas to give the idea of the texture of his hair and then there were some other areas that I, like in the nose and the lips where I actually worked to form the lips and the nose in the direction that those features would appear on the face. The other thing I wanted to say about this piece is that many of the images of Barack Obama from this time period depict him as he appears as a candidate. He is usually shown wearing a suit and tie or at least a dress shirt and a tie. At the time that I made the piece, he was still a senator and not the president yet. I decided to depict him as he might appear as say, a scholar or as a father, as a husband, as a colleague. I chose to depict him not in his classic suit and tie as a candidate but more as a person. The person that you might know, the person that you might be acquainted with, the person you might have worked with or have worked on a project with. I wanted to depict him more as he appeared as a man and not so much as the formal candidate for president. I chose the facial expression that I thought expressed his kindness. I was reasonably pleased with the outcome of how the eyes appeared because I thought they made him look like the kind of gentle, concerned individual that I believe him to be. He is somewhat smiling in the image and I think he looks gentle yet hopeful and I felt like that expression best expressed my desire for what I wanted this art piece to look like.

KM: Is this typical of your work?

CK: I have done some previously beaded, intensely beaded pieces like this, but they are a labor of love to produce so they are not something that one can crank out so to speak very quickly so I tend to be very, very particular about what my subject matter is. The beaded pieces I have made previously are all portraits. I haven't beaded any landscapes or anything like that, so I tend to be very interested in people, however, I have done a lot of other more traditional styles of quilting as well. The one thing I'm known for in some of my other work is my computer digitized machine embroidery work which is how I made the button that says, 'That Won.' That is the digitized technique that I use on an embroidery machine. Much of my other work is more indicative of this type of embroidery work. After I made this beaded portrait, now I'm getting interested in doing a series of beaded portraits along the lines of this one. So, I think this particular piece is going to be my stepping off point for a series of beaded portraits of a variety of people that I'm interested in conveying in my artwork.

KM: What are your plans for this quilt?

CK: Of course, it is going to be shown at an exhibit ["President Obama: A Celebration in Art Quilts."] at Montgomery College in the Washington, D.C. area. It is actually in I believe Silver Springs, Maryland and will be shown with a grouping of other quilts that feature Barack Obama as the subject matter and the show is to be, is going to open just in the period of time right after the inauguration. The show opens I believe February 13, 2009 [the show opens on February 9 and the reception is the 13.] and will run for a month or so [March 5.]. People in the D.C. area or people can come from out of the area to visit the show. I believe my piece is the only beaded piece in the show. I think some of the pieces may have beaded accents but as far as I know mine is the only one that has the President completely depicted in beads.

KM: Once it comes back, what are you going to do with it?

CK: Well, it kind of depends. I've had a couple of people interested in purchasing the piece so I will have to see how that goes. Of course, I can make another one just as soon as I have a spare eighty hours or so to sit around and bead [laughs.] but I will have to see. I have a few of these beaded pieces hanging in my home so I'm sure I can find a place for Obama in my home as well as in my heart. [laughs.]

KM: I don't remember in my lifetime a presidential candidate inspiring so much artwork. Why do you think Barack Obama has inspired so many quiltmakers to make quilts?

CK: Clearly Barack Obama is--and you are correct about that. Clearly he has inspired artists in all sorts of mediums, not just in the quilting world. I think there are a number of reasons. For one thing his entire message as well as of course his physical look and his background is such a breath of fresh air, it is such a new era I believe in the whole way we chose a president. Being from Colorado, we were one of the important swing states so of course we received quite a lot of attention during this particular election, not just because the Democratic National Convention was here in Colorado, but I think because we've got young people very interested in this candidate. Clearly he had a message that was of particular interest to both minorities and to the youth and of course the youth in this country, they are very visual because of the Internet, because of the computer age the youth of our country are very, very geared toward the visual response that things are given and so I think this is one of the reasons. I believe a lot of the art is being made by people who are under the age of fifty say. I'm fifty-one so I'm kind of in that upper group of people but I'm very excited. I think the other thing was the fact that the posters and the artwork that was created by Shepard Fairey, who made the well known posters of Barack Obama that say 'Hope' on them really got people excited. I think that really jumpstarted a whole excitement about the image of this man and he did almost become like a rock star type. That is a fantastic thing because you have this image now that is very recognizable and an image that people can connect with. I think we saw that with the number of youths that voted in this election, numbers much higher than any previous election and of course with the minorities and there are certainly a number of incredible talented minority artists out there that made fantastic artwork, but I saw things on the internet, just crazy things. People were making Barack Obama portraits out of candy and out of paperclips and all kinds of just crazy materials. People really went wild over it. When I began this particular portrait that I made, I actually started with what I thought were going to look like kind of pop art colors like the brilliant blue and the bright red, the orange, the yellow, but towards the end, it sort of developed on its own. I ended up having a portrait that looked very African I thought. Of course, in African countries they use beads in their artwork but I thought it was really interesting that I started with something that I expected to come out as more of a pop art thing and then it ended up being this very ethnic looking kind of thing. That was one of the reasons I finished it with this sort of ethnic fabric border because it just took on kind of a life of its own. I always find that fascinating with artwork and I'm sure this same concept is shared by many artists. That thing where you start off with a concept of one thing and then at some point it takes on a life of its own. The piece starts to talk to you and it starts to develop into what it wants to be, as well as what you want it to be. I think that is part of the artistic method and the artistic journey is that you discover things as you go along. It is like the piece teaches you things about your own artwork and that's kind of the magic of it.

KM: Tell me a little more about your creative process.

CK: I will go along for a while, sometimes I don't have any idea of anything I want to make and then all of a sudden some thing will really spark my interest. For instance, with this piece when I saw and heard Senator McCain referring to Barack Obama as 'that one' I immediately saw this in my mind's eye 'that w-o-n, won,' that really sparked my creative juices. Sometimes it will come off almost like an explosion internally where I'm then ready to begin that eighty hours of beading. I knew that a beaded piece would probably be a really great idea, it would maybe different than what other artists would be doing and the other thing is I was watching a lot of TV over the time during the election and I had all of these recorded episodes of John Stewart's, "The Daily Show" and the "Steven Colbert Report" and I would spend hours and hours beading while I was watching these recorded episodes of this so that really got me going, got me very interested in making this particular piece. The act of beading actually soothed my anxiety during the election coverage and the incessant ads on TV. It is always a little bit of a mystery where some of this inspiration comes from. I get ideas. I get, like many artists I get ideas from all sorts of sources. Obviously this was a very important subject matter and Obama's image was everywhere during this election time. You couldn't really avoid it, but I get ideas from a lot of other sources for my artwork. I get a lot of ideas from my travels. I get ideas from other artists. I get ideas from experiences that I have, emotional things that happen to me, ideas from loss, ideas from successes, so I gather those things but I think to start one of these beaded pieces you really have to get juiced up to do that because to put that kind of commitment and effort into it you've got to really be committed to the subject matter that you are going to pursue.

KM: Describe your studio to me.

CK: [laughs.] It is kind of funny because normally when I sew I'm in my actual studio which is a small room in the basement of my home, but because of the fact that this piece is beaded, and the beads are kind of portable I can take them anywhere. I made this piece almost entirely while sitting on my couch watching TV over the last month or so of the election and so this is sort of 'the couch potato piece.' Because it is easy to take the beads with you, they are reasonably portable and the fact that I wanted to watch TV during the time that I was making this I ended up having it right on the couch there, but I very rarely make artwork while I'm sitting on the couch. Most of the time my work is made in the studio. I have a pretty traditional studio. It is a small room in my basement with my embroidery machine and lots of thread and lots of fabrics and pretty much the traditional kind of things for a quilter. I've even made these beaded pieces while I've been on vacation at various places and people are always fascinated with seeing how these beads are going on one by one and kind of curious about the process. The process I use for the actual beading is pretty simple. I would image there is a technical name for the type of stitch that I use but I don't know what it is. I just started making it up on my own and just developed it as I go. It is kind of a meandering kind of thing. When I start with this area of the eye doing the beading I end up just sort of meandering with the beads as I go and I will work on certain areas more or less as it inspires me. I generally will work one color of the beads at a time and then kind of work my way through the other color values and try to work pretty much from the center of the piece out. It takes quite a bit of thread too to work these. I use a traditional beading thread that is readily available in any of the bead stores so its not, the materials are not particularly complex. It is pretty much the simple types of things that most people use for beading. Let me think if there is anything else I wanted to say about this. I bead on a base of cotton and then once the beading is all finished then I can organize how I want to finish the framing area. I typically use a welt to border these beaded pieces. There is a three dimensional quality about the beading itself and the welt stands up away from the piece. It gives a nice three dimensional kind of finish to the overall piece. In some of the beaded pieces I've done use quite a bit of hand stitching around the beaded area. I didn't on this particular one because I wanted it to be maybe a more simple kind of a finish so that the focus would really be on the face itself. I've done a variety of different kinds of finishes on my beaded pieces.

KM: Tell me about your interest in quilt making.

CK: I started making quilts when I was a very young child. I was very interested in making things as a child. I liked making crafts, I liked cooking, I liked anything that had to do with making things. My mother taught me to crochet when I was very young and so I went through a period of time doing a lot of crocheting. We had an old sewing machine around the house and one day my mom showed me some things, we just had some scrap fabrics and she showed me a little bit about how to use a sewing machine and right away I got extremely interested in that and I would spend hours, and hours and hours sewing. I initially made a lot of garments for myself, little skirts and little blouses and odds and ends of things like that and then we took a vacation in Minnesota when I was about fourteen and while I was there my grandmother and all of course her neighbors and friends, everybody was into quilting and I really got the bug for it after I got back from that trip. My grandmother gave me a few quilting patterns and an old aunt back there gave me a big box of scrap fabrics and a lot of the fabrics were old prints and things like that from the 50's and 60's and I really went crazy making quilts. Then later into the 1980's- that's when the art quilting genre really started to explode. I got very interested in combining my art experience with my sewing and quilting experience, I thought it was a great combination. I really got quite involved in making art quilts. I made landscape quilts. I made a lot of abstract quilts too so I made a variety of different kinds of quilts. I'm still very interested in that so these beading projects are more of a side thing that I do periodically but the bulk of my artwork is in the quilting genre and especially with an emphasis on this computer digitized machine embroidery. My husband and I own a computer company and my husband [Chris.] helped me quite a bit to learn how to do things on the computer so I'm very interested in pursuing a lot more with my embroidery and maybe incorporating embroidery with beading in a more contemporary fashion.

KM: How many hours a week do you quilt?

CK: I quilt quite a few hours a week. Typically, especially while I was working on this beaded piece because I really wanted to get it finished before the inauguration in that time, I spent, oh boy I spent about thirty hours a week beading on this particular Barack Obama piece, but I'll typically spend twenty to thirty hours a week quite often on artwork. I don't work an outside job right at the moment so I try to put as much time as I can into my quilting work.

KM: Do you belong to any art or quilt group?

CK: I do. I belong to a couple of different groups. Colorado has a rather well known group that has over two hundred members, called the Front Range Contemporary Quilters. I've done quite a bit of work with that group. I've been a member for over ten years. I was the exhibits chair for a few years with that group so I worked on their exhibits and so on. I do submit my work to a number of national competitions and some international competitions, so my work has been shown in Japan and Germany and all over the United States as well. I have a couple of pieces that are currently touring with different touring groups so they are in museums and art centers around the United States.

KM: Whose works are you drawn to and why?

CK: I have a couple of artists whose work I'm highly influenced by. I'm extremely influenced by the work of a Spanish Catalan architect named Antoni Gaudi. He made a number of elaborate works in the City of Barcelona, Spain. He did a lot of work with tile and mosaic. I think a lot of that is reflected in my beading work. I'm very attracted to the colorful aspect of his work and the very avant-garde shapes that he used in his work. I'm also influenced by the Russian artist, [Wassily.] Kandinsky. I love his work; I share his birthday coincidentally and I'm very interested in not only just his art work but in his art theories as well. There are a number of quilt artists whose work I admire. Most of them are contemporaries of mine. I'm very influenced by the work of a [Washington.] D.C. area artist, Sandra Woock, and the work of local fiber artist, Christine Ambrose. I find their work extremely compelling and fortunately they both happen to be close friends of mine so that's always handy. I've relied on them a lot of times to help me, to help critique my work and give me advice. There are a number of talented quilt artists from our state, from Colorado, as well. The Front Range Contemporary Quilters Group, the group I mentioned earlier, has speakers that come every other month and we've had most of the nationally known quilt artists give talks to our group. Many of them have given classes. I've taken a number of those. I try to get new ideas and stay current with different kinds of techniques. I think it helps sometimes to stretch yourself to take a technique that maybe you wouldn't normally be attracted to but you learn from everything you do.

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

CK: I primarily think of myself as an artist because I studied art in college and I've done a number of other types of artworks. I've done a lot of watercolors. I've done some ceramic work and silk screen. I've done other types of art work so I think of myself more as an artist than a quilter. I haven't made a lot of traditional quilts so in that respect I didn't come from the traditional quilting world, I really came more from the aspect of the fine arts world from my background in painting and that sort of thing. I guess for me it is more natural for me to think of myself as an artist than as a quilter. I try not to limit myself too much. I'm willing to use other kinds of mediums in my artwork. I don't think of myself as a traditional type quiltmaker in that respect. In fact, this particular piece did not really involve much in the way of any quilting. The beading was really more the focus of this particular piece so I suppose I'm in that respect, my piece is a little bit of a stretch for a quilt show. But yes, I definitely like to think of myself more from the background of an artist. My career has been as a hairdresser and a makeup artist and so I've worked with a number of different kinds of mediums that are very tactile. It is very tactile work to be a hairdresser and also to be a makeup artist, so I tend to think of all of my artwork as being included in this whole artistic journey that I'm taking in my life.

KM: What advice would you offer someone starting out?

CK: Starting out in the fabric world?

KM: Yes.

CK: My advice is to get out and see some of these quilt shows. The traditional ones are a good start. We have a fantastic museum here. The Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum right here in Golden, Colorado so for any of the locals in Colorado this is a great place to start. Visit these quilt museums. Many of the art museums have textile and fiber departments. The Denver Art Museum here in Colorado has a collection of quilts, both traditional and some contemporary and I think that is a great place to start. Get out and look. For some people if you don't have a museum, go visit a quilt shop. There are all kinds of classes around. I can't name probably any state in the United States that doesn't have a quilt shop. To set foot in one and just take a visit, see what inspires you. See what you like. See what kinds of fabrics you are interested in. I think most of these quilt shops in the area have beginning quilt classes so you can make a small project, see if it rocks your boat. I think you have to dive in and try something before you know if you're going to like it. There are all kinds of shows, both on television and there are shows through the internet, there are demonstrations on all kinds of the internet sites about sewing. We are in an information explosion age right now. It's almost impossible to not find information on how to do anything and quilt making is a part of that explosion. There are all kinds of really interesting and easy techniques that can be attempted quite quickly and learned easily for starter projects if someone is wanting to start out.

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

CK: For the art quilt genre, for those that are making art quilts I think our biggest challenge is to get the galleries and the fine arts world to recognize quilt making as a fine art. That's always been a challenge because it ends up often being tied to the concept of your grandmother's quilt making and so to try to break away from that traditional, to try to break away from that strictly traditional concept of what is a quilt it is a challenge. There tends to be an idea of that can't be art because, 'Oh my aunt made those,' or 'My grandmother made those.' I think that's a shame because a lot of the traditional quilts that were made by people's grandmothers and people's aunts were magnificent examples of what could really be considered fine art. Of course, now the techniques for contemporary quilt making have come so far that many of the quilts that you see nowadays don't even bear any resemblance to your grandmother's quilt, nor do they bear much of any resemblance in the techniques that are used. There is a lot of experimentation with sewing on all sorts of modern fabrics, things like Tyvek and Mylar and all sorts of new materials. The contemporary quilters are experimenting with things that didn't even exist in your grandmother's day. I think that the challenge is to continue to break away and continue to see quilt making for the fine art possibilities that it has.

KM: What does your family think of your quilt making?

CK: [laughs.] Sometimes they think I'm crazy but most of the time they appreciate it. My children, [Amanda and Anton.] were both very excited about this Obama beaded piece and of course they got the opportunity to watch it and see it develop day by day because it is such a laborious process. They observed the decisions I made. I had a couple of areas that I actually tore some of the beading out and reworked it and had discussions with them about what wasn't working and that sort of thing. My husband is very supportive. My whole family is very supportive of this quilt making, but I think sometimes they come in and think, 'What crazy thing is she doing this time?' [laughs.]

KM: How do you want to be remembered?

CK: How do I want to be remembered? I think I would say that I would like to be remembered as [laughs.] I would like to be remembered as the screwball that I truly am and as someone who had fun and who had a positive outlook about the world around them. I would like to be remembered not only for my artwork, I would like to be remembered as being a good mother and a good wife and a good person, a good friend. Being a part of this Obama art exhibit makes me feel really privileged. I feel privileged not only to be alive at a time like this where there are exciting changes going on in our country, but I feel privileged to be a part of this particular exhibit. It has great historic significance. It is a great time to be alive and to be an American.

KM: Are you planning on going to the exhibit?

CK: Yes I will be attending the opening. I think I'm coming from the farthest. I know a lot of people in the D.C. area, Philadelphia, but I think if I'm not mistaken, I'm the one that is going to be traveling from the farthest to the actual opening. [oh, no there is a quilter from San Francisco attending as well.]

KM: Are there any specific quilts that you are going to spend some extra time looking at?

CK: I plan to get over to the textile museum in Washington, D.C., that is some place I would like to visit. Of course, I'm very interested in seeing the other quilts in person that are in this exhibit and that's my primary interest, but since I'm also quite interested in other forms of fine art I plan on getting out to some of the local galleries and try to see what is showing at some of the other museums.

KM: Why is quilt making is important to you?

CK: Quilt making is important in general because it does continue a tradition that was started hundreds and hundreds of years ago and of course almost all societies, all cultures have had some type of form of making things with textiles. It is a long traditional for all cultures, but I think for me I have a real strong tactile urge to make things. Part of that was from my background as a hairdresser, that is a very tactile profession and I think that for me personally I like the idea of leaving a personal legacy in my own home, my children's own pieces that I've made and I think it is a way to carry on your own personal story of what kind of a person you are. Were you a person of humor? Were you a very serious person? When I look at these quilts that my grandmother made and that my aunts made and things that I have, I can tell what their personality was like through those quilts and I think that is a really important thing for our society. We are in this society that is very much machine driven where things are very much mass produced and quilt making is still something that people have to really put their heart and soul into. It's important for your family and for the generations to come after you, for them to see your actual handy work- the person that actually made that stitch. As we become more and more a society of machine made things I think we need to have things that are handmade, that carry on. That is so important.

KM: We are almost out of time believe it or not. Is there anything that you would like to share that we haven't touched upon before we conclude?

CK: Let me think. Let me just think for one minute here.

KM: Go right ahead.

CK: [long pause.] You know honestly I can't think of a thing.

KM: Where do you see quilt making going? Where do you see your quilt making going?

CK: I definitely feel there is a strong future for all forms of quilt making. I see the art form expanding further and further. I think there will be people who will continue on with the much more traditional quilt making. There will always be a market so to speak for that and an interest in that because it has such an appeal with the geometric quilts and those sorts of things, those traditional forms. I definitely see a stepping off into the future for more avant-garde use of the stitch and unusual fabrics and things like that. There will be more and more experimentation. I'm already seeing this. People are doing all sorts of things with fabric, with rusting fabric and burning fabric and tying fabric and all sorts of modern forms of dyeing fabric. People are naturally by nature very experimental, especially the youth that are coming up. They are very experimental. They are willing to try things with unusual techniques; they are willing to try things with unusual fabrics and combining unusual and futuristic fabrics with traditional ideas of hand stitching and that sort of thing. I think there is going to be a fantastic future for quilting. There is no doubt about it. You see quilt making as it comes into political and social use, like for instance the AIDS Quilt Project is a good example where quilt making- a traditional idea is being used to commemorate something that was a very contemporary issue and I think that will continue to have appeal for many, many years to come. I don't see any end in sight for this art form. I think its only going to expand and grow and become more and more compelling as time goes on. I really look forward to seeing what kind of new things people will be coming up with in my lifetime and I'm sure it will continue into the future and after I'm gone people will be making traditional quilts, they will be making contemporary quilts because it's almost like an addiction. It is never going to go away.

KM: What about your work. Where do you see your work going?

CK: I want to do a lot more experimentation with this beading work and also with the computer digitized machine embroidery that I've embarked upon. I really would like to see more and more of that explored because I think we are just touching on that. It hasn't really been worked to its fullest. Down the road I would like to have a studio with a number of commercial embroidery machines and get some students in there or colleagues of mine in there to experiment with some new forms of digitizing. The sky's the limit on that as best I can see. I haven't even scraped the surface of it yet, but I can imagine the combination of various computer programs and things to aid in the visual making of fiber works of all kinds.

KM: Carol, I want to thank you for taking time out of your day and sharing with me. You were absolutely wonderful.

CK: Thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity. This archive is amazing and I know it will be appreciated for many years by so many people and I thank you for your tremendous commitment to this project.

KM: Thank you. You are more than welcome. We are going to conclude our interview at 12:23.