Join us for First Friday in Louisville, featuring Calla Michaelides Lokku & Camille McMurry
Fiber & Form
920 Main Street
4.7.2023, 6-9pm
Meet Calla and Camille
Calla Michaelides Lokku is an Artist with an education and professional background in Fashion Design. She is enamored with settling into the physical sensations of art making, in order to escape the mind and meet the true self. Through hand dyeing and unique compositions, Calla is currently experimenting with how to take the ever popular craft of Macramé and transform it into something her own. She can also be found experimenting with small, quick, color driven abstracts inspired solely by conversation with individuals. Calla’s work is largely collaborative in that the majority of her pieces are custom made for a specific person, family, home, and intention. Calla enjoys the creative dance between herself and collector - welcoming the challenges and new perspective each person brings. Ultimately, Calla intends to give people a piece of work that makes the subject understood.
Camille McMurry, is a fiber artist. Her pieces are made from sustainably sourced merino wool, which she hand- dyes and felts in her Denver, CO studio. She creates all of her wall hangings by hand, using a variety of weaving, felting, knotting and dyeing techniques. She is generally inspired by patterns and colors in nature. She finds great joy and connection to the world around her through weaving uniquely textured tapestries.
Learn more about Calla and Camille in our Q+A!
Where do you find inspiration?
Calla: I find inspiration when the chatter quiets down and my mind is safe and free to roam without judgement or anxieties. Often times this looks like a quiet ride home, late at night, in the passenger seat of my husband's car after a long weekend filling up on quality time with friends or family. The tension between immense love and having to say goodbye, leaves me sitting in my emotion. I have a creative protector part that steps in (every once in a while at the right time) and leads me into idea land! My work is largely guided by color which I absorb and see all around in my daily life. I try not to take inspiration from other creatives in my industry/medium and instead stay curious about what my day to day experiences can bring to life in my artwork.
Camille: I truly am so inspired by color. Often, I’ll find myself walking down the street and a particular color will grab my attention. I love to go home and try to recreate the essence of that particular color in my dyes.
What do you do outside of work?
Calla: In my free time, when I'm not working one of my gigs OR working on my artwork, I like to move. I participate in "Benevolent Instruction" which is a improvisational movement based practice that is prompted by prerecorded readings. The practice was started by dancers but is for everyone. I love to explore my physical body and use it as a means to get out of my head. This and yoga help immensely.
Camille: Easy! I love to salsa dance and make craft cocktails.
Calla Michaelides Lokku
What is your dream project?
Calla: One of my (many) dream projects is a large scale communal fiber art installation that is started by myself, and finished by members of the community- no rules, just exploration. I envision an enormous "wall" of fiber, color, and knots made over the course of the installation.
Camille McMurry
What are you working on right now?
Camille: Right now, I'm working on a custom weaving for a client. This is such a fun and special commission for me because of the colors. This client has a painting that she loves and she want's the weaving to hang opposite to it, so we picked out six of the most prominent colors and I'm hand dyeing the yarn to match the details of the painting.
Calla Michaelides Lokku
How did you arrive where you are today?
Calla: Growing up, I was always interested in creativity. I loved art class as a kid and spent over a decade in dance classes, performances, and competitions. I was in the Drama Club in high school and spent most of my time behind the scenes helping with makeup and costumes. My parents were always avid supporters of me and my siblings in perusing whatever we felt passionate about in our higher education. I believe that it is an extreme privilege to have that kind of familial support especially when seeking out an education in a creative industry. When it was time for me to decide on a college to attend, I took my love for dress and applied to some fashion design programs. I ended up attending Drexel University’s Westphal College of Media Arts and Design and graduated in 2015 with a Bachelors of Science in Fashion Design. From there, I worked in New York City for five years as an assistant, and then an associate Fashion Designer across a number of different brands, categories, and price points. I have worked with sustainable brands, luxury ready-to-wear, childrenswear, menswear, womenswear, swimwear, lingerie, infant apparel, plus sized womens ready-to-wear, postpartum apparel, commercial apparel, and more! This variety came by way of fulltime work, freelance work, and consulting work. I absolutely loved being able to learn about and work on so many different categories and brands during my time in the Industry. After a few years, however, I realized the Industry (and the city) weren’t exactly for me. I had planned to move on from my career in the Fashion Design Industry just as the pandemic hit and I got laid off. Luckily, I was ready to pivot. I quickly picked up a part time job at a yoga studio which lasted about a week before all of NYC went into full on lockdown. With all of the time in the world, I decided to really go for my creative business which, at the time, was a total hobby/side hustle. Time is the most valuable thing in my life, and having it all “to myself” for the first time, was an incredible scenario for cultivating my craft and exploring my creativity as a visual artist.
How did your business come to exist?
Camille: I started my career as a product developer in London for a high end British brand. I was working in their knitwear development department and was constantly surrounded by beautiful garments, think wool, cashmere, alpaca etc. It was basically my dream job, so when my husband and I decided to move back to Denver, CO, I panicked a little bit. There were hardly any Denver based clothing brands at the time and I just felt that my options for work (that I would actually enjoy ) were very limited. On moving back, I just decided to take the plunge and try my own thing. I knew that I especially enjoyed working with mills and factories to hone and develop the color story of every collection, so I decided I wanted to experiment first with dyeing natural fibers. From there my business grew first into a hand dyed yarn company, and then weavings and artwork just followed naturally.
Get in touch with Calla & Camille
Calla: https://www.communecalla.com/
Camille: https://broadwickfibers.com/collections/wall-hangings
Calla’s Instagram: @commune_calla_
Camille’s Instagram: @broadwick_fibers
If you are a local artist/crafter/maker/indie business owner and would like to be featured on our blog, please fill out this form or contact Ashley at ashley@westandmainhomes.com with questions...we can't wait to learn all about you!
