Mary Hertert

I am a believer in shared, community art. My work has been in textiles, blacksmithing, and now, without studio or supplies- figuring out how to find natural ways to share art experiences. From Alaska to Colorado and now, Utah – my passion is engaging all ages in the creative process. I have a different take on the word “creative”. I call it “A creative can move oneself out of a locked box”. A practicing creative sees solutions to any kind of obstacle by creating new paths around, through, over/under or exploding or vanishing it. Not just artwork, but in life. I strive to help people see the creative in themselves and develop ways to employ that creativity as a life skill.

I left Alaska in 2011 with my husband, who was having difficulty with depression, to find the light of the desert and sun of Western Colorado. I started Color Creek Fiber Art in 1997 as a “paint your own textile” studio. A true lesson in a leap in faith given I was leaving the computer industry to go exactly into the deep unknown. Thinking it could only be an Alaskan phenomenon, I closed it down only to find myself reopening the studio in Grand Junction, CO. it was a learning experience allowing me to engage in teaching on a University level, up my artist’s game and get on runways I never believed possible. All until 2016 when I shut it down. I had run out of things to say in my chosen medium.

Now I play gongs, along with finding projects that benefit others. I am a lover of collaboration in whatever medium shows up. I live on a horse sanctuary in Old La Sal, UT, south east of Moab.

Languages and travel:

I am actually a very poor second language speaker, although not for lack of trying. I went to school in Sweden - could read the language, but hardpressed to carry on a good conversation. Went on to try learning Gaelic. Easier to pretend I could speak it because noone knew I couldn't. Tried German, French to no avail. Was in the Peace Corps in the Philippines. Could bargain with the best at the markets, but only those who spoke Ilocano. Also been to Honduras, Mozanbique, Zimbabwe, and Eastern Europe when it lived behind the iron curtain. I can say I lived in Alaska since it was treated like a foreign country.

Sustainability and diversity:

I am an activist by genetics. My mother taught us well in how to treat the land around us. I cut my teeth on the first Bottle Bill in California just as recycling was starting to be necessary. I've gone on to efforts to protect public lands, wildlife and open space. In my own artwork, I had garments on the runway that then came home to be taken apart and reworked into something else. I've had the same fabric used in six different garments and two wall pieces before it finally landed in a quilt. Most of my runway garments used recycled materials made from other garments who had walked.

I also took my university students through two fashion shows where all the garments were made of recycled materials. One student made a Marie Antonette costume entirely out of phone books with the yellow pages as the garment bodice and the skirt and hair out of the white pages. Absolutely brilliant.

The projects I do now are out of recycled and upcycled materials. Latest is crocheting the twine from the hay bails and finding uses for the plastic bags the horse shavings come in. That's a challenge.

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