‘Woven Threads’ of Maryland artists Judith Kornett and Virginia Sperry
For Maryland textile artists Judith Kornett and Virginia Sperry, the story behind their work emerges from the audience. The art comes to life when viewers transform from passive observers into active participants, drawing out the elements that resonate with their own lives.
“My job as an artist is to find a way to bypass the words and the ideas that have been burned in their heads, and bring it back to an experienced reality,” Sperry said.
Contemporary storytelling is the centerpiece of Woven Threads: The Shared Translations of Judith Kornett and Virginia Sperry, an exhibition on view in the UMGC Arts Program Gallery in Adelphi, Maryland, through November 1, 2026.
Every piece in the show shares fiber as its primary medium, while showcasing techniques unique to each artist. The works span steel-and-fiber sculptures, ceramic forms, hand-spun fiber installations, and woven rugs. Visitors are surrounded by yarn-constructed walls and get an up-close look at a weaving loom.
Behind the art
During the August 30, 2026, opening reception, Kornett and Sperry joined UMGC Arts Program Curator Treston Sanders to discuss the personal journeys shaping their creative directions.
Kornett’s Hokusai I Love You, her sole shaped work of colorful hand-spun fiber, honors Katsushika Hokusai, the Edo-period Japanese artist whose masterpiece The Great Wave off Kanagawa has influenced Kornett’s practice for two decades. She noted that the piece integrates symbolic motifs rooted in Carl Jung’s archetypal psychology, representing images that have anchored her lifelong artistic path.
As owner of NOMA Gallery in Frederick, Maryland, Kornett is a printmaker at her core, using block prints—a method of hand-printing on textiles with inks—to create mixed-media works with drawings and collages. After years of hand-spinning raw fiber, she began experimenting with fiber art, using blending techniques to achieve the exact color and texture needed.
Her art can be whimsical and eccentric. In Madonna and Child, Kornett challenges viewer expectations by incorporating a children’s rocking chair and a pair of 30-year-old ruby slippers.
Known for her abstract works of steel, polymer clay, and fiber, Sperry’s focus is always on how to expand a medium.
“How does a particular medium play with another medium? I’m creating the form out of steel, which at first you think is hard and unforgiving, but it’s actually fluid. And what happens when you add fiber, which is soft and motherly to this less forgiving material?” Sperry said. “It all comes from a desire to explore—exploration of material, and of myself with the material.”
Her circular steel-and-fiber work, Turquoise Spiral, draws inspiration from a winter storm she witnessed while watching wild wolves in Yellowstone National Park, channeling deep blues, grays, and snow whites.
Another sculpture, Life Forms, is a seven-part steel and yarn installation woven with masonry nails. Conceived during a snorkeling trip in Belize, the structure evokes sea urchins and reef life. She noted that the piece has sparked dialogue among even the youngest art connoisseurs—children who see everything from deep space to microscopic organisms.
Origins of the craft
Creative immersion began early for both artists. Raised by an artist mother and a musician father, Sperry grew up in an environment where creative experimentation was constant.
“I became good at making art from just about anything,” she recalled, noting childhood projects made from broken, melted crayons. After training at the Martha Graham School in New York and earning a master’s degree in dance movement therapy, she turned toward visual art in the 1990s, initially sculpting jewelry from polymer clay before scaling into welded steel.
Kornett’s trajectory was sparked by care packages of discarded art supplies sent by her aunt, an arts educator who founded an inner-city youth initiative at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Her aunt remained a lifelong mentor.
“She always told me I was an artist and not to take anything less from anybody,” Kornett said, “And I believed her.”
Woven Threads expands an extensive regional archive stewarded by UMGC’s Arts Program. Established in 1978, the university’s 3,000-piece permanent collection features one of the state's largest holdings of Maryland art, alongside international works and historic Asian art.
Woven Threads: The Shared Translations of Judith Kornett and Virginia Sperry is on display in the UMGC Arts Program’s Lower Gallery through November 1, 2026, in Adelphi, Maryland. The gallery is located at 3501 University Boulevard East, Adelphi, MD 20783, and is open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. ET daily.