By Layla Kalinen
Eagle Times Staff
CHESTER, VT — Linda Diak started offering commissioned-fine-art quilts four years ago.
In the short time she began her business, she achieved substantial recognition.
She was recently awarded an Amber Grant from WomensNet, a $10,000 grant for women in business.
The award, which funds the creation of new work, makes Diak eligible to win the group’s annual $25,000 businesswomen’s grant, to be announced in January.
Judges and community voting will decide the award.
“I start out with a hand-drawn pattern, but sometimes I have to freestyle pieces in and it works well to bring originality and a visual interest,” she said.
Diak also has nine quilts hanging at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center.
Recently, when Diak was at the exhibit in the hospital’s fourth-floor mall, she said a couple of people came to her and thanked her for her art.
“They said how tired they were and how uplifted the exhibition made them feel,” Diak said.
The quilts will be on display near the Oncology Department through Jan. 3.
Forty years ago, a young Linda Diak and her husband, Tom, were just starting in the fiber business after buying a sheep farm in Grafton.
She spun her own wool, and soon, her husband began manufacturing the spindles she used as a nationally renowned weaver.
She traveled across the country to shows and won several best-in-show and first-place awards for her creations, making her name recognizable in the niche art community.
“I have done commissions for a man’s dog; that was the largest. I made a quilt of the stone house on Main Street, and I did a highland cattle view for a man who raised cattle,” Diak said.
They moved off the farm in Grafton, and four years ago, Diak stopped weaving and started creating fine quilted art pieces.
While traditional quilts are also on her website, she specializes in quilting portraits, scenes, landscapes and sometimes historical replicas. She specializes in art quilts of her design as well as commission work.
Diak said fiber art is not always seen as true art.
“I think when people see my work, they understand it is truly an art form that is approachable,” Diak said.
You can help Linda win the grant by voting for her at https://ambergrantsforwomen.com/october-2023-amber-grant-awarded-to-linda-diak-quillts/
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