Gold Medalist Portfolios

I had been weaving in the Navajo tradition for about 30 years when I received a woven double point Krokbragd wall hanging from a family member in Norway in 2018. The desire to be able to create a similar weaving prompted me to take classes at Vesterheim to learn how it was done. What I learned in those classes and seeing the weavings in the museum stimulated me to create weavings using the Norwegian traditional techniques in combination with the tapestry techniques I had already learned from my years of Navajo weaving. So many possibilities, so little time!

My great grandfather, Chris Skagen, immigration from Vik in Sogn og Fjordane, Norway in 1882. When I asked him once what he missed most about Norway, he replied, “the mountains and fjords.” “Chris’s View” was an attempt to capture the daily view he had of the mountains and Sognefjord out the window of his home in Vik. 

I have been influenced most by the classes I have taken through the Madison Area Technical School Adult education program and classes taken at Vesterheim along with Vesterheim’s wonderful collection of weavings in the Norwegian tradition. The challenge given to me by Jan Mostrom helped me think more creatively to come up with something new – the vest of 2024.