Contemporary artist Jeanne Williamson Ostroff has been an inspiration to me since the early 2000s, when I first read an article about her in the magazine Quilting Arts. I remember reading that Jeanne, when her children were young, went to visit an old friend from art school. Jeanne asked her friend what kind of art she was doing. Without a word, the friend got up, went to a closet, and pulled out a garbage bag, and opened it. The bag was filled with tiny paintings—all the woman—who also had young children at the time—could manage to do while juggling a home and family. They both cried, and reading the story, I too felt their mix of joy and sadness. Joy that they understood each other, and loved their families, but sadness of dreams interrupted. Sadness that her friend’s art time had shrunk to almost nothing, but joy that she still carved out a few minutes to make art, even if her art was only quick, tiny paintings. Jeanne’s mixed media work is inspired by, and often includes, orange construction fencing. We see it everywhere, yet few people look at construction fencing as a subject for art. Most of us just wonder what’s being built, when will the fencing be taken down, and we recoil at the bright orange eyesore spoiling the scenery. Jeanne, however, has for decades incorporated the round-edged rectangles in her work. Her early work uses the shapes in a very graphic, bold way, but her later work incorporates delicate vintage textiles with the construction fence shape. I admire the way Jeanne has taken one theme and used it in so many ways to tell the story of her own life’s sorrow and joy, and used it to explore painful family memories and medical events. While the art and craft world is constantly pushing new craft machines and tools, new designs for stencils, stamps, brushes, and paints, urging people to use the latest and most popular colors, Jeanne “marches to her own drummer.” Jeanne’s simple yet unique theme—construction fencing—and ability to use that shape consistently and uniquely in her work for decades, is inspiring. Her work is always interesting, and usually has a story within the story. She inspires me to be true to myself as an artist, to do work that is unique to me, and embrace my own style unapologetically.

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