 |
In what seems like a former life, C. Alana
Tibbets earned a Ph.D. in biology from Arizona State University, studying an
endangered species of minnows. In 1999, she moved to Illinois when she and her
husband got jobs teaching at a university. Two years in, she discovered that,
among other things, she didn’t like the politics of academia. "I started looking
around for something else to devote my life to." She had always sewn. "I was of that generation of
girls who took home ec in middle school and high school and loved it." In
graduate school, she had started a quilting circle to help maintain her sanity. "So I wandered into a quilting
store in my new hometown." Soon, she was teaching other women how to quilt. Six
years ago, she began making dolls. "It was the perfect outlet for my love of
sewing clothing." Alana works in a studio at the back of her
house, which sits in a charming setting full of flower and vegetable beds. "When
we moved in, we dug up the lawn and turned our yard into a woodland garden."
When she works, she sews the individual pieces—the arms, legs, heads—for 10
dolls at a time. For inspiration, she goes through old magazines, looking for
textures and designs she admires. She then searches her large collection of
recycled fabrics for the right material for the clothing. "People who know what
I do often leave bags of material on my front porch." One wall of her studio is
white and completely devoid of decoration. "Sometimes when I’m sitting at my
sewing machine, I want to be able to turn away from it and let my mind work on
the project without any distractions." Almost a decade after she left the lab, people often comment on her surprising career switch. "They always ask me how I got from biology to art. I tell them, the two things are not that different. They perceive science as rigid and analytical, but in both art and science, you're always testing hypotheses: will this work, will that work. They're both extremely creative."
 Stumble It!
archive »
|
