Featured Arkansas Artist: Judy Tipton Rush

The Arkansas Studies Institute houses four art galleries, including a retail gallery, featuring the work of Arkansas artists and art related to the state. This post is part of a bi-weekly series featuring ASI gallery artists.

Judy Tipton Rush
Biography

Judy Tipton Rush is a self educated Fiber Artist who studied at the University of Arkansas and came to her avocation from an art background. Her work has been exhibited in numerous juried shows and has toured both the United States and abroad. Her works are included in many private collections.

She received a first place award for two dimensional art at the juried 1985 Arts, Crafts, and Design Fair in Little Rock, Arkansas. Ms. Rush has received several other awards for her work and has been published in All Flags Flying, (Bishop, Houck) 1986 by E. P. Dutton in association with the Museum of American Folk Art, New York, New York for her work Immigrants Hope.

Her works have been juried and accepted for Special Exhibits by Quilt San Diego/Quilt Visions 2004 and Art Quilts at the Sedqwick Cultural Center in Pennsylvania for the year 2004. Most recently her work was accepted as one of the winners in Quilters Newsletter Magazine's 35th Anniversary International Competition. The quilt titled Beyond the Panes was featured in their September 2004 magazine issue and traveled with their exhibit to the Houston Festival in November 2004.

Most recently Ms. Rush was selected as a major artist to the Donald Reynold's grant to Warren, Arkansas YMCA Renovation and Decoration Project.

Ms. Rush is a Professional Member of Studio Art Quilt Associates, Quilt San Diego-Quilt Visions, and American Craft Council. Currently she is lecturing and teaching classes on color, design and composition, as well as many techniques.

Artist Statment

My work is an extension of my imagination, always functioning at a level of levity to keep myself entertained.

It is in the spirit of expressing a language of recognition between me and the viewer that I create through light, movement, and color. It is in my nature to pay attention to the gentle nudging and reveal some of my sensitivities.

The cloth, stitches, and embellishments have a language of their own and a tactile quality I just can't resist. Combined, they are a sensual experience always at work giving me great joy and serenity.

My abstracts are a visual language of a felt or perceived experience, either real or imagined. I react intuitively, always waiting on spirit for inspiration and guidance. The interactions of color are intended to offer an escape from the real and provide in the imagination real drama, adventure and joy.

It was Albert Einstein who said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge." I believe it! We are all either green and growing or we are ripe and rotting. Come, grow with me!


Click here to see more work by Judy Tipton Rush.