238TextileCollective

Betsy Disharoon

One can only grow into the future by examining the past.

Growing up in the South as a “proper young lady” demanded that I learn and practice needlework. I was one of the lucky ones because through women’s liberation in the seventies, when I discovered I could become a professional outside the home, I continued to find great satisfaction in handwork of all kinds. The ego did take a detour into dentistry for thirty years to “elevate my status” but even during dental lectures the process of knitting kept me alert and relaxed. The dental profession IS handwork after all!

Today after years of retirement from dentistry I finally feel at home spiritually and creatively when I am consumed with my handwork. Luscious sensory feedback through touch, sight, and smell was the trigger for love at first sight (touch and smell) of wet felting for me. Full gratification and creative feedback occur only when skin is in contact with my product. Tools are at times necessary but that direct sensory loop feeds the soul!

Of what is my fiber made?

Betsy Off My Center.jpg

Betsy Disharoon is a born again fiber artist, after a thirty year diversion into dentistry, where she also enjoyed working with her hands and mind. Growing up in Texas and Louisiana among women who always had various fiber handwork in process and men working from the carpenter’s shop to the oil fields, placed manually creating in her genes. At six years old she learned embroidery; at 10, quilting, then at 14, knitting engrossed her. Studying art, with a focus in ceramics, at University of Iowa laid a professional foundation. From there, wet felting, joomchi and stitching have been added to her “addictions” through which she immerses her efforts in expression and becomes consumed.

Presently Betsy’s work can be seen illustrating the liturgical seasons at First Congregational Church of Milton.
She can be reached at bdisharoon@comcast.net

Eva Camacho-Sanchez

D. J. Drumm