“A man would have a plan,
I’m not a man”

By Tama Westman Women’s Independent Press, March 2004

What woman doesn’t wish she could live out her days doing what she loves, in her own creative space and rake in fame and fortune while doing so? In the small whistlestop town of Carver , MN, Linda Schutz is making her dreams come true, a stitch at a time.

When this work-at-home divorced mother of three needed to get out of the house, she decided to open up her own studio space, Hazelnut House. But when Linda Schutz sits down to work in her studio, it’s not to piece squares into a quilt. A textile artist, her unique and often controversial art quilt designs are born only after as she gets a feel for what the quilt wants to be.

Schutz’ designs pin top awards. She was one of several winning quilters chosen in the prestigious international Hoffman Challenge Award in 1995. This was a collection of quilts that toured the country for a year and she also was included as a guest artist on the Smithsonian Art Train in 1997. More recently, Schutz won Second Place in a local area quilt show in 2003 and then took First Place at the 2003 Minnesota Quilt Show. Her unique designs will also be included in the 2005 Quilt Art Calendar of the American Quilters Society.

But beware…her quilts are not for the feeble-hearted. She designs original art quilts that often include nude subjects. Afterglow and Sometimes We Just Talk are among her most controversial art quilts.

“I have fun experimenting with fabric as a medium. I did the nudes to open people’s minds – to see quilting as an art form.” Schutz says, “When nudes are seen in oil and sculpture, they are accepted as artwork. They aren’t vulgar.”

Even so, she has been asked to remove her quilt show entries from time to time. “I am not trying to offend anyone,” Schutz insists, “It’s art.”

Not your average agéd granny working on a nine-square bed-quilt, Schutz is a hips-swinging, eyes-sparking, sassy, sexy woman who just happens to have a brilliant head for business that accompanies her artistic pursuits. Among the myriad of original art quilts displayed in her studio is a yet unfinished piece depicting a naked woman sitting on the rocks by shore.

A subtle takeoff on P.D. Eastman’s popular children’s classic, Go Dog, Go where a male and female dog race about town, and each time their paths cross, she asks him, “Do you like my hat?” Schutz’ laughs, “You might ask her what she is doing there sitting naked on the rocks. But she simply responds, ‘Never mind about that, do you like my hat?’”

The first in a series of three naked female forms, Schutz said her next nude will feature the woman’s naked form placed on a pedestal. Her personal depiction of a trophy wife.

Other areas of her quilt artistry receive equal recognition. The head of the Minnesota Parrot Heads commissioned her to do a t-shirt quilt for Jimmy Buffet. The one-of-a-kind quilt incorporated t-shirts from across the country and symbolic images that were quilted in and hangs in Buffet’s executive office in Key West , a gift on his 50 th birthday.

She has also become intricately adept at photo transfer quilts. This is where she makes a memory quilt from an original design she creates based on photos people bring her. She says, “Tell me the story of this photo.” After listening, Schutz brings the story to life as the fabric begins to emulate the story. Her piece, Windows by the River, pictures three stained glass windows representing the three churches in Carver. Framed against a purple-black hand-dyed background, the windows support a secondary focus of a single doorway spread across the three windows. Taking First Place in the Viewer’s Choice Awards at the 2003 Minnesota Quilt Show, Schutz auctioned off the quilt for a $2 lottery ticket during the town’s summer Steamboat Days celebration. The winning ticket holder sold the quilt back to a townsmember who then donated it to hang in Carver’s historic Church by the River.

The Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal, a Twin Cities publication, picked up on a local news story on how Schutz and other business ladies in the super small town of Carver, MN, population under 2000, have initiated a new rotary club, all female of course, called The Ovary Club. The ladies work towards the betterment of their community and constantly create ways in which to put Carver on the map.

Her business savvy packs a punch, much like her art quilts. Deciding that Juki was simply the best manufacturer when it came to sewing machines, she convinced the Japanese company to allow her to become a distributor.

Unhappy with standard sewing tables, she designed her own and called upon a local cabinetmaker and friend to make it a reality. “He had a hard time understanding that I wanted a table with seductive lines,” she laughed, “but we eventually saw eye to eye.” Now, Schutz and her Carver cabinetmaker can’t come up with enough Hazel Tables to meet demand as those who sew flock to have one of their own. The table even has an optional pneumatic lift with three adjustable settings to raise your sewing machine.

Feeling her way into new art forms, Schutz fills her hours and her studio with her own hand-dyed fabric. She also makes and sells beautiful silk scarves and has started painting whimsical designs on chairs and stools she picks up at garage sales and antique shops. “Lately, I sew during the day and paint at night,” says Schutz, “What’s my goal? I don’t know. A man would have a plan. I’m not a man.”

Whether you’d describe her creative ventures as an endeavor or an addiction Schutz is pioneering an arena of art with initiative, bravery and more than a thimble-full of gumption. She says, “This is the time for me to do what I want to do.”