Praxis featured in Cleveland Magazine Article

July 2015 Issue.

Waterloo Arts District is getting a creative boost with three new specialty studios.

by Kaylyn Hlavaty
​

Jessica Pinsky was worried changes to Cleveland Institute of Art’s fiber department in September 2014 would cost the school its looms and diminish weaving in Cleveland. So the CIA adjunct faculty member — with help from the school — opened Praxis Fiber Workshop in June, filling a 1920s building with 30 historic looms, five studios and a dye lab.

in the loop † The looms, leased to Praxis for $1, are available to students and the public during biweekly classes. “[Praxis] has been really committed to the mission of making weaving available to students and the public,” says Pinsky.

Color theory † Originally an oil painter, Pinsky eventually gravitated toward the loom. “I would go home and sew to calm myself down, which was my meditation,” she says. “Weaving was a more appropriate medium to express my ideas and approach toward color.”

To Dye For † The dye lab gives visitors a place to concoct their own colors, and a dye garden will be open by next summer to grow indigo and other plants used in natural dyes. “Indigo is one of the greatest and oldest natural dye traditions found throughout many cultures,” Pinsky says.