"Process, materials, and imagery define my work. Inspired by the intrinsic beauty of yarns and threads, my research into historic textile traditions has allowed me to simplify and combine ancient methods of working. Over the years, my work has changed as new ideas have come into focus. Experimentation with color manipulation in a series of woven panels led to ideas about enriching the surface with embroidery and paint, and this led to constructions in two and three dimensions. Whether loom-woven or hand manipulated, dyed, embroidered, pieced or constructed, the essential connecting thread to fiber-related material is retained.
New ideas come from direct experience and experimentation with the materials. When the distinguished weaver, Anni Albers, spoke of the material and process as...... .. “a willing bearer of ideas”.....I could immediately relate to the idea of the internal dialogue with the process to find its creative potential and to transcend the technique.”
Nancy Belfer is a fiber and mixed-media artist. She is a retired professor from the Design Department at SUNY Buffalo State College. Her MFA is from the School for American Craftsmen at the Rochester Institute of Technology. Her work has been in included in numerous regional and national exhibitions as well as several solo exhibitions. A large survey exhibition entitled AFFINITIES: the work of Nancy Belfer, was held in October, 2014, at the INDIGO Gallery, Buffalo, NY, with a catalog essay by Nancy Weekly, Head of Collections, Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY.
Nancy Belfer has been awarded a SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching and the Crafts Fellow designation from the National Endowment for the Arts. As part of the State Department Arts in Embassies Program her work was placed in embassies, including a woven and embroidered panel displayed for three years at the American Institute in Taiwan.