Our artists make beautiful artwork and lead interesting lives. Here are some stories to help you get to know us better. Click on any image to view a larger version.

Kate Van Sciver, host of Studio Showcase for more than a decade, specializes in creating objects of home and personal adornment. Many of these are made from formally beautiful but currently compromised components. She has a B. A. in Communications from the University of Pennsylvania and a Certificate in Painting from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

Kate started out as a restorer of gilt frames, china and glass and oriental rugs, and continues to restore oriental rugs currently. Kate also combines fragments of unsalvageable oriental rugs, vintage textiles, designer cottons, silks, and discarded fabric samples to make pillows, ottomans, hats, scarves and tote bags. She finds it very satisfying to make something beautiful from what might otherwise end up in a landfill.

Kate's jewelry incorporates semi-precious stone beads, pearls and sterling silver components with occasional recycled vintage beads, found objects, PMC and wire wrapped elements. She enjoys joining objects, patterns, colors and textures in unexpected ways. Kate's website is www.textilian.com.

Eleanor Broaded founded Soaring Heart Jewelry in 2001 when she began integrating her pottery work into jewelry.  An artist since 1980 when she was a ceramics major at the University of Hawaii, this venture has been a natural artistic progression for her. Ms. Broaded has worked in several community art settings including Manchester Craftman’s Guild, in Pittsburgh, PA, Blue Mountains Art Centre in Sydney, Australia, and Indianapolis Art Center in Indiana. Currently she works in her home studio and participates in many local and regional art fairs and events.  She joined Studio Showcase in 2002.

Ms Broaded’s nature-inspired designs are created in a rainbow of colors.  She fires a luster glaze onto them to create an iridescent glow.  Each piece is hand-formed, fired in the kiln at least three times, and embellished with gold, silver, beads, and pearls.

Eleanor works as the Studio Showcase jury coordinator. If you are interested in participating as an artist in the future, please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

You may recognize Shirley. She hosted the TV show, "The Sewing Connection" for many years, showing all her techniques and sewing tips. She has turned her love of fabric into weaving wonderful tapestries.

Shirley Adams passion has long been in the fiber arts, which have inspired her several careers. Shirley's love of art began as a child, and continued throughout her academic career.

First came years as a college professor of clothing and textiles which led her to develop The Sewing Connection television series which aired throughout the United States, Canada, and Australia.

Designing fashions for 17 seasons resulted in a vast pattern collection for fashion sewing where engineer's mind meets artist's soul.

Her art includes framed abstracts and wearables. Shirley makes each piece from an image or an emotion. Available in galleries and art shows. Check out her web site (www.shirleyadamsfiberdance.com) for more current information about where to find her work.

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Originally from Colorado, Cathy now lives in Carmel, Indiana, with her husband and two dogs. She has loved art for as long as she can remember. Her work and imagination sometimes run away with her as she create bright colorful pieces, which have become her trademark. Her work is whimsical with the goal to make others smile and feel good.

Though Cathy enjoys working in many mediums, the art she brings to Studio Showcase is mostly ceramic.

About clay, Cathy says, "I love to create with clay. Working with clay is so messy and interesting to watch as a blob turns into something as it grows and shapes itself. When I am finished with a piece, it is so satisfying but then I get to take it a step further and watch it come alive with the glazes. Color kind of talks to me and I add whatever wherever. One of my favorite pieces I enjoy looking at as well as adding to is an old tree stump in my yard which I have turned into a totem pole. I make a bunch of masks or faces and nail them to the tree stump."

Cathy has recently started a new program for HABITAT FOR HUMANITY. She collects artwork from local artists to be given to the new homeowners as a house-warming present for their new home. You can see more artwork by Cathy at her web site, www.creativeartsbycathy.com/

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At the end of nurses’ training at the University of Illinois, Caryl met her future husband, who became a career naval officer. They have literally lived coast to coast and points in between! When not packing or unpacking, and raising the girls, she enjoyed working in coronary care units, ending up in Indianapolis in 1987 coming from Washington, DC.

In the late 70’s on a play day with some other fiber friends, she discovered marbling – and did it in a small pie pan, but backwards!  Several years later, she reconnected with the technique in a class and learned the right way!

Marbling is a centuries-old technique, thought to originate in 15th or 16th century Persia. Caryl starts with water thickened with methylcellulose (like gelatin beginning to set), acrylic paints thinned with water, and fabrics or paper prepared with alum (a pickling spice). Using a dropper, she places the paint on the surface of the thickened water. The paint floats and spreads out, but the colors don’t mix!

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Designs are made by dragging a comb or stylus through the floating paint. Once the patterned is developed, she lays either paper or fabric onto the surface of the water to pick up the design. The paint can be skimmed from the water to begin again!  It’s magic with infinite possibilities!

Caryl says she particularly enjoys marbling one piece several times to develop complex images. Come to Studio Showcase in October to see her beautiful work.

Nancy Lee makes jewelry and sculptural objects from silver, gold, copper, brass and found objects. She says, “The first time I touched a pastel to paper and smelled that chalky smell. I was eight years old. I've been involved in expression of emotion through art ever since.” Everything she has seen or experienced has influenced her work.

Born in Carbondale, Illinois, during a sweltering summer while her father was taking finals at Southern Illinois University, she’s been trouble ever since. Besides jumping off of shed roofs all over her small-town neighborhood in central Illinois, she was the youngest student her art teacher, Mrs. Henderson, had ever taught.

Nancy has dabbled in all forms of art and craft since then. Now making hand-fabricated jewelry and sculpture under the name Nancy Lee Designs, and living on the near eastside of Indianapolis, Indiana, she is part of a vibrant art community. She is active in her local neighborhood, both as a neighbor, an artist and a teacher, working towards expanding creativity and creating community.

To view more of Nancy's beautifully hand-crafted jewelry, visit her blog at http://www.ndesignsmetal.com/gallery/.