Sharp Notions: An Afternoon with the Authors and Textile Artists

Join award-winning authors Marita Dachsel and Nancy Lee, along with acclaimed textile artists Jenny Judge and Bettina Matzkuhn, for an exciting discussion of their book This nonfiction anthology explores writers and artists from different backgrounds’ complex relationships to fibre arts. “Chances are you or someone close to you is currently in an ecstatic relationship with yarn, thread, or fabric.”

Event details:

• Doors open at 1:45 p.m.
• Registration is required, and seating is general admission.

Marita Dachsel co-edited with Nancy Lee the anthology (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2023). She is also the author of Glossolalia (Anvil Press, 2013), Eliza Roxcy Snow (rednettle press, 2009), and All Things Said & Done (Caitlin Press, 2007). Her poetry has been shortlisted for the Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry, the ReLit Prize, and the Acorn-Plantos Award for People’s Poetry. Her play Initiation Trilogy was nominated for both a Jessie Richardson Award for Outstanding Original Script and The Critics’ Choice Innovation Award. Her essays have appeared in multiple anthologies. She is an assistant teaching professor in the Writing Department at the University of Victoria, lives on Lək̓ʷəŋən territory with her family, and knits on the sly at any opportunity.

Nancy Lee is an avid quilter, knitter, embroiderer, and all-around fibre arts fanatic. She is the award-winning author of two works of fiction, and , and a poetry collection, What Hurts Going Down (McClelland & Stewart, 2020). Nancy has served as Writer-in-Residence for Historic Joy Kogawa House, the city of Richmond, and the city of Vincennes, France. She is an Associate Professor at the UBC School of Creative Writing and the co-creator of the internationally acclaimed EdX education series How to Write a Novel. She lives in Steveston, BC, with her husband, the author John Vigna.

Jenny Judge is a craft-based installation artist whose work incorporates glass, ceramics, and fibre materials. She holds an MFA from the University of Minnesota in sculpture and was first introduced to fabric arts in a residency at The Banff School of Fine Arts in the 1980s. Her practice also includes drawing, writing, and curatorial work. Her work was recently exhibited in the Korean International Ceramics Biennale, and her installation “Phase Transition” is included in Corning’s Glass Review 44 publication

Bettina Matzkuhn explores ecology, weather, and geography themes in her fibre work. Emphasizing hand embroidery, she values the versatile language of textiles. Matzkuhn holds a BFA and an MA from Simon Fraser University, and is the recipient of Canada Council and British Columbia Arts Council Grants. She has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions across Canada and internationally. Her work is in national public collections such as the Surrey Art Gallery, Cambridge Art Galleries and the Weldon Map Library at Western University. She lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Host or Publisher West Vancouver Memorial Library