Wearable InLight

Thirty artists will present their wearable art on September 5 at Wearable InLight at 9pm... review the map in the post above for the exact location.

K. McCarthy, owner of the Phoenix of Carytown Grace D. Johnston are exective producers heading up this wearable event which celebrate 1708's 30^th Anniversary and – of course - Light!

Fan's of 1708's annual Wearable Art attended a preview of the InLight models and designers at the Can Can in Carytown last night! For details on their illuminated threads contact 804.354-0711.

The Wearable InLight Artists:

Madison Fisk was born and raised on a farm in Keswick, VA. She attended her first year and a half of college at California Institute of the Arts. Madison began painting at an early age. After too much time with a brush in her hands, she began to explore sound and video instillation. Now, a third year sculpture major at VCU, most of her
work revolves around fabrics, metal, film and epoxy. Madison has one dog, Zero, who runs her life. Her dream is to one day remember what she went downstairs for.

Natalie Hakim since she can remember, has dreamed of being a fashion designer. In searchv of fulfilling her aspiration she now attends VCU as a fashion design major. She draws inspiration from both tangible and intangible things as her ideas continually change and evolve through the creation of a garment. She just completed her first few fast paced and exciting months in New York interning for an avant-garde and innovative fashion house. After graduation she looks forward to moving permanently to New York to begin designing and gain the knowledge and experience that she needs to someday start her own label.

Clarissa Berry is currently a senior in the Interior Design Department at VCU and will be graduating in May. She grew up in Haymarket, Virginia and has always been fascinated in creating something new and unique. Growing up she took close notes from her mom as she was busy getting ready for craft shows, sewing us matching outfits and knitting various items. For her ‘mystical dress’ the inspiration was drawn from nature and childhood memories of capturing lightning bugs in a rural setting. She has also been influenced by her design classes and the city of Richmond which exposed her to industrial design. This is reflected in the use of soft textures and flowing movement as well as the harsh metal-like appearance.

Alice Fine is a native of Richmond, Virginia. She is a rising freshman at VCUarts, after attending Open High. Fashion has dominated her interests since she was eleven years old. Alice pulls inspiration from many different sources, including early MGM movies and musicals, Jane Austen novels, modern architecture, and her peer's
artwork. Alice has participated in many Richmond fashion events, including Worn Again and Heidi Story fashion shows, where she works. Her future goals include entering the Fashion Design track at VCU, studying abroad, interning at small design houses, and participating in the fashion world as much as she can!

Katherine Jones is a freshman at VCUarts with plans to study fashion design. She learned how to sew when she was a little girl and designing developed into a passion as she grew up. By the time she was in high school Katherine was designing and creating formal gowns for herself and friends. She also loves to travel, style hair, read, and paint. Her camera is almost permanently attached to her hip and she is just as at home in stilettos as she am in comfy sweats and a tee-shirt. Many, many thanks to her mom for all her help, patience and inspiration.

Julien Archer is 16 and a junior at Trinity Episcopal High School. Julien has expressed his love for fashion through illustrations and ridiculous costume dress since he was a toddler. He was a self-taught sewer who refined his skills at Heidi Story in Carytown, where he sells hand-screened tees. His freshman year in high school Julien attended Appomattox Governor’s School for the Arts and Technology as a visual arts major. He showed a six-piece collection in the school’s first fashion show. Julien showed two designs at Worn Again III and participated in the VMFA Teen Caffeine Cafe Stylin’ show winning “best ready-to-wear.” He also participated in the 2nd annual ARGS fashion show, in which he won 1st place. For the past two summers he has worked for Frankie Slaughter, a local artist and designer, patchworking fabrics and brainstorming designs. When Julien graduate from Trinity he hopes to attend Fashion Institute of Technology.

Jennifer Kim is a sophomore student at the Virginia Commonwealth University, studying Fashion Design. She has always been passionate about fashion and art ever since she was a young girl. She attended Osbourn Park High School and is now pursuing her dreams to become a successful fashion designer and entrepreneur.
Inspired by haute couture fashion and cultural influences, Wearable art is her first piece of garment ever made.

Shanice White is a 17- year- old aspiring fashion designer and freshman at VCU. Born and raised in Blacksburg, Virginia, White is a self- taught seamstress. Through her work, she hopes to communicate experiences and observations that are both personal and relatable on a larger scale, such as the relationship between the artist and their materials, the sources of those materials and the constant paradoxes we face in everyday life. Using fabrics (re-purposed and new) as her primary medium, White hopes to create garments that are of professional quality, but whose designs reflect their handmade origins.

Samantha Heyl grew up in Richmond and revered the city so much she decided to attend school here. She ended up in the Interior Design Department at the VCU School of the Arts and graduated in the spring of 2008. Presently, Samantha works for Beyond Ordinary Boundaries Architecture downtown, but still finds herself dabbling in other fields of art. For her, being an artist today is about being able to touch on every form of art, not just one “department”. She finds herself utilizing interior design, painting, graphic design, fashion, and sculpture in her work and believes that all around each form leads to better ideas and different ways of thinking. Samantha loves what she does and vows never to stop creating.

Sara Ben-Abdallah who has been designing costumes and clothes since high school is thrilled to pair up with Fritz Reuter, a newcomer in the fashion world. They both exchanged a lot of ideas for this competition until they settled on modeling their design after a light bulb. Fritz attends the University of Mary Washington where he studies biology. Sara attends Virginia Commonwealth University where she studies Cinema. The pair met in grade school and has been close friends and creative partners for 15 years. Sara and Fritz are very honored to be a part of this competition and would like to thank their friends and Thomas Edison.

Brittany Jones is currently a full-time undergrad student at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA pursuing a dual degree in Sociology and African American Studies, following an Interior Design degree. From sitting in a middle school classroom, the world of art has been her interest. From drawing, painting and composing literature, to architectural designs, advertising and music—they have all captured her imagination. She wants to provoke a change for the better in the art world, generally in society and more importantly to educate and enlighten each individual.

Julia Hodges is a senior at VCU studying Communication Arts. Her aspirations with her career are editorial illustration, writing and illustrating children’s books, and product packaging. Fashion and sewing are a lot different from the usual paper and paint of her major, so she is hoping to shake up my two dimensional routine with something new.

Alex Curley is a junior at Henrico High school. I am in the Visual art center at my high school. He is 17 years old and volunteered to help out at the Wearable X show last year. He is really excited that 1708 is holding another show! Alex would love to be able to show my love of art and fashion design by participating in 1708's eleventh Wearable Art show.

Olga Lader a 29 year old, is from St. Petersburg, Russia where she earned Bachelor of Fine Arts degree with a major in classic sculpture and a minor in teaching. After school she worked as a jewelry designer, but her heart was in fashion. Shortly thereafter she enrolled in the Art Academy of St. Petersburg, Russia where she studied fashion design for three years. In December 2006, she immigrated to the US and have been writing / blogging about the fashion industry for the Russian Fashion Network while working on her portfolio. She have covered the last three NY Fashion weeks, but hopes to soon be there as a designer.

Grace DuVal a third year Sculpture student at VCU School of the Arts, has been playing dress-up since the time she could walk. From those beloved hand-me-downs emerged an endless passion for thrift shops, vintage, and making everything clothing related. From tearing apart and reconstructing thrift shop finds to building
elaborate garments, using vintage dress patterns and creating her own, Grace has made it all. In 2007 she won the 10th annual Wearable Art fashion show in Richmond, VA and opened the SEAMLESS: Computational Couture fashion
show in Boston, MA in 2008. No matter what, Grace could not survive without stars, dancing, thrift shops, and, above all, her phenomenal friends and family. Thank you one and all.

Special thanks for the couture necklace by Kay Adams, available at Anthill Antiques in Carytown. 804.254.2000.


Meredith Argenzio has always been interested in fashion, art, and design She is a junior in the Center for the Arts at Henrico Highschool in the visual arts program. She took her first sewing lessons in middle school, with Heidi of Heidi Story. Last year, her best friend Alex Curley and she organized a fashion show at Henrico Highschool,
showcasing student designs in many different areas of fashion. Meredith has a few favorite modern designers, but she takes most of her inspiration from the antique styles of the past. She wanted her dress to be rustic, elegant and almost alive.

Hannah Sullivan 18, is already an experienced participant of the noted “Wearable Art fashion show.” Her junior year at Saint Gertrude High School she created a recyclable wearable art fashion entirely out of soda cans: cut and flattened into panels. Then in her senior year, she entered a fashion show at VMFA where she created a piece inspired by an African mask, for which she won an award for her Mastery of Materials. She will be attending J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College in the fall. She hopes to transfer to VCU's noted art school. Her artistic interest is in Graphic Design and Photography.

Francis Scott Horner is a Richmond Virginia based artist. He is studying Sculpture at VCU and is currently the Art Director for Poictesme, the student art review. Francis has shown in Gallery 5’s Repressed II: Art on Paper, as well as the Student Art show at the Anderson Gallery for 2 years running. He has also shown in Do Not: Fold,
Bend, Spindle or Mutilate at the Washington Pavilion of the Arts, where his piece is in their permanent collection. He has assisted artists such as John Baymore. Francis has also been an assistant at a local pottery studio where he helped set up shows.

Kevin Blow was born 11, December 1986 in Franklin, Virginia, just outside of the area of his upbringing, Southampton County, Virginia. He remembers as a child always being drawn to the beauty of the human body, specifically the way different peoples adorn it. His interest in visual art has lead him to experiences with the Governor’s School for the Arts in Norfolk, a BFA degree in Fashion Design at Virginia Commonwealth University, and a semester abroad at the prestigious Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London. Kevin is planning to enter to the fashion industry in the near future.

Holly Sullivan (working with Brittany Shade) is a student at VCU entering her senior year in the Fashion Design program. Most of her design influence comes from the work of comic book artists like Jamie Hewlett and Ben Templesmith. She particularly loves conveying contrast in her designs through the innovative use of color and texture. Apart from fashion, Holly enjoys reading graphic novels and learning about various subcultures;
especially those which influence her own style using contrast and variety as a form of beauty. She also has duel citizenship in England and hopes to start her fashion career in London or New York City.

Brittany Shade (working with Holly Sullivan) is a senior in the Sculpture and Extended Media, Crafts, and Art History
departments at VCU. In my work childhood fantasies, organic designs, and lightare the most prevalent inspirations. I’m all about the details, small and minute. Details, especially mistakes that come through the process of making, are what make objects so interesting and unique. These processes of course come through the hands. I have to touch every aspect of my pieces with my bare hands; it needs to be a personal relationship between me and my materials so that you may have a personal relationship with my pieces.

Adam Krehbiel Sculptor, painter, designer, inventor and composer/musician, playing over thirty-two instruments, including vocal operatic in four languages. Adam keeps very busy as a student of VCU Fine Arts Sculpture. Adam has been designing garments for both men and women since the age of about twelve. Adam also invents his own MIDI (Musical Instrument Definition Interface) controllers for use of mixing/ controlling music live. Adam’s Garment for this year showcases his new Atlantis and Lucerno Technology. Atlantis, a wireless MIDI Controller that allows the garment wearer to control the musical composition played live by her finger tips, and Lucerno, a luminescent string that Adam has invented in conjunction with a Luminescence Corporation with the goal of saving energy.

Mauren Pereira has been designing and sewing since time immemorial. Or at least that's how it feels. Since her first project of a black-and-white polka dot baby doll dress just like the one in Clarissa Explains it All, clothing and media has been the center point of her creative voice. A Theatre VCU alumnus and award-winning costume designer, she is currently enjoying her third season as a costumier for the Richmond Ballet, and freelances in theatrical and couture design.

Rebecca Witt is an undergraduate sculpture major at VCU, and is now entering her final year. She is graduating with a double minor in crafts and art history. Her work has been displayed at the semi-annual arts festival Spiral, and shown at the ADA Gallery. She has been involved with the local art collective FEAST, which shown in several shows at galleries such as 1708, and exhibited at Scope New York. She is currently showing at Grape and Cheese, an independent wine store uptown. This will be her second year participating in wearable art, and she is excited to contribute to the Richmond InLight event.

Wearable InLight Judges:

Tom Papa is an attorney, artist and one of the founders of Plant Zero based in Richmond, VA. He is also a developer in downtown Richmond and a supporter of the arts and artists in Richmond.

Lori Waran as a result of growing up in Richmond, has developed an appreciation for
everything local—local art, local tomatoes, local trends and, yes, local news. As a
current publisher for Style Weekly, Richmond’s Alternative Newsweekly, Lori is able
to contribute to a little piece of Richmond history every day. Lori also feels fortunate
to be involved in other Richmond publications which are published by Style Weekly
including Belle, Homestyle and Richmond Giving.

Henry Swartz graduated with an undergaraduate degree in Fashion Design from Pratt Institute. He designed dresses and sportswear outside of Philadelphia for Bobbi Rodgers Industries. He then began teachin for the Fashion Design program at VCU while earning earned a masters degree in Costume Design. He left VCU to teach at the University of North Texas and later at at Washington University as chair of the department. He has done freelance work in Dallas as well as designing the private label collection for Knights Catalogue. Henry now teaches at VCU in the Fashion Department

Joe Seipel is the Senior Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Director of Graduate Studies at VCU. His previous position was chair of the department of Sculpture at VCU for seventeen years. His own studio production ranges from conceptually based objects to multimedia pieces and robotics. He had exhibited both nationally and internationally.

Frankie Slaughter after nearly a decade of living in Asia Frankie returned to Virginia where she redefined her career based on her relationship to the thoughts and feelings from her time in Asia. Her art brought forth adornments from wearable garments to sculptural pieces such as ceramic necklaces and paper clothing.

Wearable InLight Master of Ceremonies:

Harry Kollatz is the senior writer for Richmond Magazine, the host for the Richmond Magazine Theresa Pollak Prize for Excellence in the Arts and a co-founder of The Firehouse Theatre Project.