USA Projects

     BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION                                        My art training consists of the basics. I grew up with two artists. My father was a commercial artist. My mother was a teacher at the University of Chicago. I was surrounded and nurtured by a community of artists who taught me the skills I would need to hone and use my creative abilities. When I was 15  I moved to Juneau Alaska to live with my older sister and graduated from high school there. Then I moved on to Haines where I learned to bead from Mary Choate, an expert Tlingit skin sewer and wonderful friend. We spent many nights around the propane lanterns where I perfected the couching technique, (the two needle method of bead embroidery). She taught me to make mittens and moccasins. Eventually I saw the vast possibilities that the beads had to make artwork and it became my medium of choice.

  1980 - 2011

Shows: 2010 -  VIVI'S OF SANTA FE    223 W. San Francisco, Santa Fe, MN 87501      Kate Boyan's Beadwork Odyssey    Solo show

2009 -           BUNNELL STREET ARTS CENTER   106 W. Bunnell, Ste A Homer, AK 99603     Deland Anderson and Kate Boyan     Two person show

2009 -           EARTH, FIRE AND FIBRE       XXVII    Anchorage Museum   Honorable mention Pushing the Boundaries of Beadwork

Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA New Directions in Contemporary Beadwork              

 Winchester Center Gallery, Las Vegas, NV Visions of Alaska            

 D.W. Studios, Santa Fe, NM Subversive Crafts Exhibit        

 M.I.T. Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA 7th Annual Beaded Bag Show      

 Spirit Beads, Juneau AK Kate Boyan and Susan Anniskett, Two-Woman Show.     

 Edward Dean Museum of Decorative Arts       Cherry Valley, CA

The Affair in the Gardens Juried Art Show      Beverly Hills, CA

Fish and Fur Show  University of Alaska, Anchorage, Best of show,  Anchorage, AK

Calendar Imagery in Beaded Relief     Solo show. Santa Fe Weaving Gallery. Santa Fe, NM  

Galleries:

Sheldon Jackson Museum                                       Haines, AK

Taranoff's                                                            Sitka, AK

Off Broadway Gallery                                         Skagway, AK

Object of Bright Pride Gallery                                 Juneau, AK

 Kenai Art Gallery                                                Kenai, AK

Morning Raven Gallery                                        Ketchikan, AK

Ilanka Cultural Center                                         Cordova, AK

Art Diva's                                                            Taos, NM

Vivi's of Santa Fe                                              Santa Fe,NM

                                                                            American Crafts Museum                                    New York, NY

The Common Ground                  Greenwich Village, New York, NY                                                                                    The Alaska Shop                                 Park Ave, New York, NY

The Dream Bag, purchased by the Rasumson Foundation for the Pratt Museum.

Artworks have been donated to: The Sealaska Heritage Foundation

Alaska Women's Resource Center The Pratt Museum Breast Cancer Project 911

Beadwork Quilt Winds of Life Charity Gala

Work has been published in:

The New Beadwork                                    Harry Abrams, New York, NY Beaded Amulet Purses                        Beadworld Publishing, Seattle, WA Threads and FIBERARTS                        The Taunton Press, Newton, CT Ornament Magazine                                    Carol Bench & Robert Liu BEADWORK                                                Interweave Press, Loveland, CO The Portland Bead Society, Portland Oregon, gave a grant for the full price of the publication  "THE BLUE BEAD". This book, "The Blue Bead" is a fictional account of a young beadworkers experience with the gift of an old trade bead and how it finds its way into her life in present day Alaska. It is based in part on historical fact. Where a bead has been and who its previous owner was often remains a mystery. The 25 illustrations were laboriously beaded, each taking over 200 hours to complete, some much more than that. "The Blue Bead" has taken 10 years to finish and is an exquisite labor of love by author/illustrator Kate Boyan.