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Winsted master weaver Tina Puckett, a self-taught artist and owner of Tina's Baskets who has been weaving sculptures, baskets and wall art for more than 20 years, brings her series of original woven flower and landscape wall hangings to Carole Peck's Good News Cafe and Gallery in a new show titled "Dimensional Weaving," continuing through July 28.
Puckett's works have been exhibited at museums, art galleries, libraries and craft shows, including the Slater Mill Museum in Pawtucket, R.I., and the Cheongju International Craft Biennale 2003 in Korea, where she won the Honorable Mention award in basketry. Her most recent exhibition earlier this month was presented at the Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival in Reston, Va.
"My imagination and sense of subtly different hues have influenced me to create contemporary sculptural art forms that are dynamic and richly colorful," Puckett observed.
In her artist statement, Puckett noted that the flower and landscape wall hangings featured in her current show are products of creative "doodling," which "helps me visualize form and technique."
"The materials dictate the initial form, which is ten incorporated into the finished product," she observed. "Take, for example, the petals of a flower which are held together to form a complete shape, or the burst of a sunlit mountain woven in a traditional weave with colors that define the landscape. Weaving is a lot like painting -- you can lay down layers of colors and textures to bring forth subtle or vibrant imagery."
Puckett has been influenced by natural materials grown locally in the northwest corner of Connecticut. A favorite material in her creations is bittersweet, a vine whose character often shapes the form that a basket or sculpture takes.
An artist who mixes her own dyes, Puckett's strong sense of color shows in the subtle use of dyed reeds to realize each work. "Ultimately," she said, "a bit of love slips into the weaving of each piece, never to be retrieved."
Her woven works have been featured in magazines, newspapers and on television, including Yankee Travel, Prime Time Connecticut, Weekend in New England, The Country Magazines, the Pawtucket Times, The Slater Trader Newspapers, and the NBC PAX TV Sunday Morning Show. Additional information on the artist and her works is available on her Web site at www.tinasbaskets.com.
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