Laughing while she says it, Jinny Lee Snow tells us she was sure lightning would strike when she went against some of the standard practices she'd learned about quilt making. But then questioning the rules has been a major part of Jinny's life as an artist.

From her studio in the house she designed, Jinny looks out the huge windows onto views of the mountains and Salt Lake City in the distance, and describes the experiences that brought her to quilt-making. Having compulsively created art projects as a child, she says she was elated when she was accepted into the weaving, programs when she entered the graduate school at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan, Encouraged to experiment, Jinny tried weaving with weeds gathered from nearby fields, plastic ribbons, even strips of fur from rummage sale clothing purchases, always testing the limits.

Jinny went on to become an instructor of design at Wayne University and the University of Utah. She was the owner and designer of an interior design business for 25 years, with clients from New York to Hawaii, while also serving as an editorial scout for 20 years for Better Homes and Gardens. Many of her own interior designs were published during that time.

Then in 1990, after retiring from her business, she decided to indulge her love of fabrics and quilts. “I read a lot of instructional material about quilting,“ Jinny says, and she tried her hand at making a number of traditional quilts, mostly Log Cabins.

Feeling constrained, she began to experiment. She tried painting the fabric she was using, and in 1994, was invited to show her work in The Oklahoma City Art Quilts exhibit. Jinny says she often will paint on a quilt if she doesn't like the way the work is developing with the fabric alone. “I have so much fun,“ she adds, “but it's scary! There's no going back once I've painted on the quilt.“

Although she's had her work accepted for major shows such as the International Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas, the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival, World Quilt and Textile, the American Quilter's Society Show, and Quilt Expo in Europe, Jinny maintains that she's still learning the skills and the art of quilting, and now more stitching to her quilts that she originally did. She continues to work her own nontraditional twists into the materials and techniques she uses, and frequently uses her quilts to express her love of the mountains, trees, rocks, and painted desert around her home and at the family's cabin on Bear Lake in northern Utah.

Jinny has found that fusing with machine embroidery allows her the improvisation that she loves in her work. She varies her design method, sometimes making a sketch and then enlarging it, sometimes working from a thumbnail sketch on the back of a phone message. “Everything is subject to impulse,“ she laughs.

Her husband gets considerable credit from Jinny for her work. “Without him, this whole dream of quilting would be dead on arrival. He continues to support my work, and the trade-off for him is that he knows I'm a happy camper doing what I'm doing. I continue to try new things with my quilting, truly believing that the greatest risk is not to take a risk.“

Biography provided by the Artist.