Meet the Talented Artists Behind Taos Folk 2024
NOTE : This page is a work in progress until we get everyone added to the page!
21 more Folks to add! ( will update the countdown number as we go! )
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Kate Mullen
Founder of Persimmon Moon Farm, Kate Mullen is a dedicated maker, farmer, and forager based in the high desert of Arroyo Hondo, New Mexico. With a deep passion for the land and its natural abundance, Kate handcrafts a range of natural skincare products, including cold processed soaps, salves, and bath salts. She draws inspiration from the wild and cultivated plants around her, using organic oils, farm-grown herbs, and time-honored methods to create each item with care and intention. On her five-acre farm in Arroyo Hondo, Kate grows medicinal herbs and keeps bees, harnessing the healing power of nature to infuse her products with the essence of the high desert. She also forages in the surrounding mountains, bringing the wild elements of the landscape into her creations. Whether it’s the delicate scents of piñon, juniper, and sagebrush or the soothing qualities of calendula and lavender, each product reflects her commitment to the connection between land and body. kate@persimmonmoon.farm
IG @ persimmonmoonfarm
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Derrick Maule
Bad Cat Hot Sauce was founded by Derrick Maule, who has been a Taos resident for two years. The company was formed from his love of food preservation, cats, and all things spicy. He plans to continue supplying his delicious, fermented, Louisiana style hot sauce to Taos and hot sauce lovers around the world for many years to come. derrick_maule@yahoo.com
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Christa Valdez
As a Waldorf educator with a deep appreciation for the precious and practical, she finds joy in keeping her hands busy and exploring multiple projects at once. Inspired by her home in Arroyo Hondo, her creations reflect a connection to her environment, an appreciation for natural beauty, and a dedication to thoughtful, handmade craftsmanship. christavaldez84@gmail.com
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Alex Schoenfeld
Alex Schoenfeld is a distinguished Taos artist. Alex has stated that as long as he can remember, he’s always made art. At 15 he tried the wheel for the first time and never looked back. He loves everything about clay; the way it feels in his hands, the state of mind while throwing, the discovery process, the quirks of the medium, and the ergonomic challenges.
FB - @alexschoenfeld
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Melanie Ritter
Melanie is an artist living simply in northern New Mexico, inspired by batik and the Taos landscape. Influenced by Modern Art, especially Fauves and German Expressionists, she focuses on bright colors. She studied Printmaking at The School of Visual Arts and The Art Institute of Boston and improved her skills with expert printers. She found batik in Boston and developed her style through studio work. In the ’70s, she worked briefly in fashion before focusing on family and printmaking. Seven years ago, after moving to Taos, she returned to batik. Since then, she has shown her work at Ennui Gallery and sell on Etsy, with pieces in Moxie and the Harwood Museum Gift Shop and Taos Folk in 2024.
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Holly Jean Montoya
Holly is a traditional cook and craftswoman. Her micaceous pottery is made from clay harvested here in the mountains of Northern New Mexico. She hand builds each piece using a traditional coil method, then fires in a pit with wood. Her hope is that each vessel becomes a treasure in someone's home, bringing joy and deep nourishment to the table.
IG @ wildomen
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Lilli Estes
Lillian Estes is a multidisciplinary artist whose work focuses on whimsy and interconnectedness. Each of her copper ornaments are thoughtfully hand-crafted with a unique one-of-a-kind design. Her two dimensional works illustrate themes of ecological reciprocity.
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Ekin Balcıoğlu / Hamam & Co
Ekin Balcıoğlu is a visual artist, editor, and curator with nearly 15 years of creative pursuits. Hailing from Izmir, Turkey, Ekin now calls Taos, New Mexico, USA, her home and artistic haven.Ekin earned a BA (Honors) from Central Saint Martins, followed by a dual MA/MFA in Visual and Critical Studies and Fine Arts from the California College of the Arts. Her artwork explores ancient civilizations and has been featured in solo and group exhibitions in renowned galleries in New York, the San Francisco Bay Area, London, Istanbul, Izmir, Ankara, and Sofia.Ceramics hold a special place in her life, intertwining seamlessly with her creative vision. In addition to her artistic pursuits, she is the Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Hamam Magazine, a globally acclaimed print periodical celebrating bathing art and culture. Hamam's innovative content and exceptional design have earned prestigious awards, including the 2021 Best Periodical Design by GMK Turkey and the 2020 Editorial Design Achievement Award.
Websites - hamammag.com ekinbalcioglu.com
Email - e@hamam.co
IG’s - @hamammmagazine @ekin_balcioglu
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Aaron and Miquela Mangum
Aaron and Miquela Mangum have been imagining and creating together for more than 20 years. Their love of Northern New Mexico and their cultural heritage have given them a wealth of inspiration and the tenacity to feed their appetite for making any and everything they dare to try.
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BrendArchuletta and Tiana Suazo
Brenda Archuleta was born in Taos, NM and raised along the banks of the Rio Grande in Cerro, New Mexico. Piñon has always been a part of her life passed on through many generations. She is grateful to be able to share this ancestral medicine with the wider public.
Tiana Suazo is a Taos Pueblo Tribal member and is Brenda’s right hand person!
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Amanda Burnham
Amanda Burnham has been working with fibers since childhood. She makes jewelry, art journals, spins and dyes yarn, knits,crochets, weaves, and makes the tools she uses in her work. The process of making things gives her the greatest joy and peace of mind. Creating handmade one of a kind items feeds her imagination, sharing these items with others is a great honor.
IG - @Mountaingirl80510 / ghost_rose_studios
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Elizabeth Burns
When Elizabeth was 10 when she took her first photo, using her mother’s old Brownie Camera: her brother in a garbage can.
Since then, she had an on - again - off - again love affair with photography. It is now definitely on. combining her images with her interests in design and making things has opened new avenues for her.
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MJ Conley
It all began in a little shop in Colorado where she was inspired to work with colored glass (40) years ago. Today she is still making sun catchers and has a kiln for creating functional bowls, plates and ornaments.
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Karen Caporino
As a child in New Orleans, a teacher gave her a piece of clay and an elephant ear leaf to press into the clay. She immediately loved clay. With nature as her inspiration, wheel throwing to keep her centered, and sgraffito as a calming, meditative technique, She makes her body of work. She connects with the ancient elements: clay, water, and fire.
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Claire Detels
Claire is a retired music professor who has developed a second career as an award-winning fiber artist and moved to Taos to pursue it. Detels specializes in free-form crochet and felting, designing and making unique one-of-a-kind accessories for home and personal wear with little reference to patterns, stitch counting, and other measures; and much emphasis on expressive mixtures of different fiber textures and colors.
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Pam DeBoer
She is inspired by the natural beauty of each precious or semi-precious stone.
Stones can convey legendary powers, such as clarity, strength and emotional healing. She combines them with silver, gold and copper to enhance that beauty, just as wearing each of these unique works of art will enhance yours.
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Roberta Duran
Roberta is a lifelong resident of Taos NM. Her art passion is Fluid Art and Resin. She creates different items like paintings, jewelry, decorative boxes, key chains, book markers and journals. Painting has become an outlet for her life. Making her smile every day. She hopes it can do the same for you. Thank you for taking the time to browse my items.
Email - bertaduranart@gmail.com
IG - @bertaduranart
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Sue Dreamer
She craves color, patterns and clothes from second hand stores… this combined with her sewing machine created Lost and Found. She puts pieces of abandoned clothing together to give them a new happy life and save them from the density of a landfill.
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Eleanor Smyth
Eleanor is a crystal communicator residing in Taos. She enjoys working with the faerie realm incorporating this energy into creating necklaces, earrings and magic wands and more. Her wands are made of special stones and are set in Polymer clay and hand painted with oils and wax based paste for added durability. Each one of her pieces are unique and portrays a different energy unique to the person it is waiting for.
smytheleanor@hotmail.com
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Jacqueline Fresquez
She has been interested in art her whole life. She is fascinated by nature and textures. Her jewelry and atr are a glimpse into the beauty that she finds in nature, memories or places she had seen. Her work speaks not only to her but for all people. She hopes to inspire people to be world changers through art.
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Laurence Goodhart
She has always loved the noise of a sewing machine and the endless possibilities when surrounded by bolts of fabric! She learned to sew as a young girl from her Grandmere Magali. Grandmere Magali was her inspiration that led her to ask for her first sewing machine. She also loves to work with different materials, textures,shapes and colors to create whimsical and elegant earrings.
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Gretchen Ewert
She lives and works in Arroyo Hondo. She is also a member of Taos Ceramics Center where she works and shows as well. Her presentation for Taos Folk is all clay: bowls. planters, tumblers, in different sizes which is an aside from the sculpture she’s known for. If you want something decorative/ colorful to place a little orchid from Trader Joe’s in, she has just that container. Pieces are both hand built and thrown with interiors glazed in white, lilac (my signature color), celadon, and chartreuse. This spring she was part of a four person show at the Stables, “Into the Light” which celebrated emerging from hibernation after two years of being pandemic isolated.
gretchenewert.com
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Amy Rostkowski
Her creative pursuits span crochet, carving naturalistic wooden spoons, needle felting, banging on the drums, crafting herbal concoctions, and cooking flavorful foods. Drawing motivation from sleep visions, a quest for non-existent functionality, mindfulness practices, and the vast outdoor wonders shape her artistic expression.
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Jill Schulman
Without the ability to actualize an idea, art would not exist. In her work, she constantly searches for the best way to translate the ideas that relate to where she fits in the world and how to reveal that through her work. Her engagement in channeling the emotional landscape, allows her ideas to present themselves in her work. Her primary interest is in combining sculpture and printmaking, often including the human form.
IG @firewomanj
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Kirsten Parsons
As a former paper maker, the transition to clay seemed natural to her. Both mediums are extremely tactile and both can be manipulated to create a marriage of beauty, for and function. Each tile is individually handmade from either red or white micaceous clay and then pit fired. The natural surface variations are created by the smoke clouds in the pit firing process.
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Peter Maxwell
Designer Peter Maxwell and his brand Made Solid produce contemporary leather goods, utilizing traditional saddle making skills learned as a child. Made Solid offers furniture, home goods and accessories - all handmade at his new Taos studio. The pieces are clean, classic, natural and unique. The work of creative friends worldwide (Japan, Mexico and West Africa) also features prominently at Made Solid.
IG - @madesolidinla
FB - @madesolidinla
max@madesolidinla.com
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Barb Raulston
Barb is originally from South Florida and has been making pottery since high school. She recently has retired from a 30 year wildlife biologist on the lower Colorado River. As bird watcher, a scuba diver, world traveler and avid dog lover, her pottery is inspired by these interests.
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Delores Nelson
Art for her is a spiritual journey. Her muse is Nature; Mother Earth and Father Sky. Her BFA was in sculpture, three dimensional forms I found satisfying, keeping her hands busy and making things.
She is a retired art teacher. She moved here in 2012 to be with her daughter, Kristie Benson Valencia, an artist in her own right. Fiber Art is her thing. New Mexico offers many kinds of material for her to use in creativity; willow, pine needles and lots of grasses that she loves collecting.
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Susie Crowley
She has been living and raising a family in Taos for 18 years. For her, the community here is so inviting and inspiring. She learned most of her crafting skills from her mom who lives in Colorado where she owns a goat ranch and makes quilts. She enjoys working with natural materials and sharing her creations with others.
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Amy Rostkowski and Ben Guihan
Ben Guihan, a local musician and artist, and Amy Rostkowski, a crochet artist and wood carver, have teamed up to create unique kitchen wares for you and your loved ones. Brighten your space and enjoy these handcrafted goods for years to come.
IG- @benguinan
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Cherie Martin Irwin
She is a fiber and mixed media folk artist who creates work from scraps, recycled materials, and found objects. She hopes to convey energy, positivity, and conservation of resources in her work.
She is inspired by art she has collected over the years, by her travels, and by a very tongue-in-cheek approach to life. She believes that art can be fun and playful, as well as thought-provoking.
IG - seattletaz
FB - cheriemartinirwin
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Sharona Vakni
Wyld Horses Jewelry is created by Sharona Vakni on the high desert prairie, along the Rio Grande,where the wild horses roam free. She studied at art college in Israel,and has traveled around the world taking inspiration from many cultures.Her unique style and exquisite color combinations appeal to all ages and pallets. Each piece is handcrafted with love and expertise, all her quality gemstones are carefully selected. Her work is displayed in galleries around New Mexico and Colorado.
IG @wydhorsesjewelry
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Jeffrey Hills
He is often inspired by a beautiful piece of wood which invites him to bring out the color and grain, in its most enhanced fashion. His goal is to give is to give the wood purpose as a beautiful crafted and engineered piece of furniture. He is primarily a self - taught woodworker and furniture designer, with over 40 years of experience and had been designated a Taos “ Living Master “. His work has been widely published.
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Cathie Hughes
Why does Cathie think fabrics make her world go round… ?
Her love of sewing came from her mother Charlotte, her grandmother Lowe and her friend Doretta who inspired and mentored her quilting almost 20 years ago. So what started with playing with scraps on the floor to creating art that warms the soul bloomed into Charlotte’s Bliss.
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Katee Klieber
Beginning in 2016, High Desert Honey’s founder Katee Kleiber has found great inspiration from her bees and community that has led her to create a lineup of health centric products to offer. From the 10+ varieties of medicinal honey to the gentle organic skin care, each item is guaranteed to enhance your well bee-ing.
IG - @highdeserthoneyco
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Kasidee Kennedy
She grew up in Northeastern Oregon and spent most of her life in the PNW. She moved to Taos about 4 years ago and fell in love with the Land of Enchantment.
She started doing pottery at the Taos Ceramics Center about a year and a half ago. Although it was frustrating and difficult at first, it taught her that with hard work and dedication, she was capable of amazing things. Ceramics has also taught her to be less attached to results and enjoy the process. A couple lessons that she has carried into the rest of her life.
IG - @Potterybykas
TikTok - @potterybykas
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Patricia Keeler, Ph.D.
Patricia holds the talent for manipulating, transforming, and metamorphosing reality. Amidst color, passion and paint, she slips through the veil, and the doors open to her where she allows herself the grace to live her own illusion. Mediums: painted silk, pastel. She is a Jungian psychologist, art therapist, school psychologist. She designed 2 projects, she donates her art services and funds them from a portion of her art sales, which include Brazil Art Assignment and Art 4 Vets Blueprint 4 Healing: 81.