The Famous Tapestry Artist
You May Not Have Heard Of
By Joan Near
Among the many new and unique offerings at CNCH 2025 at Asilomar is one workshop that will push the boundaries for today’s tapestry weavers. The early-20th century technique, taught by Minneapolis textile artist Robbie LaFleur, utilizes an open wool warp, to provide a beautiful play on light and shadow, texture, and space.
Tapestry by Robbie LaFleur
Robbie, who learned to weave at Valdres Husflidsskole in Norway, brings the technique to life in her newly developed workshop, which is based on the work of the fascinating Norwegian textile artist, Frida Hansen.
Frida Hansen, courtesy Wikipedia
Hansen, 1855-1931, is well known in Norway and elsewhere in Europe, but less recognizable here in the US. She worked in the Art Nouveau style and was unique in her age for being adept at all aspects of her tapestry creations, from dyeing the yarns to drawing the cartoon to weaving the tapestries. Back in her day, these tasks were more likely divided among specialists.
Hansen was abandoned by her husband after bankruptcy and made her way in the world by selling tapestries in the late 1800s. Eventually she opened a weaving studio in Oslo, and she began to make a name for herself. At the 1900 World’s Fair in Paris, Hansen was awarded the gold medal for her tapestry Melkeveien (The Milky Way). This work and others hang in museums in Germany and Norway.
The Milky Way tapestry by Frida Hansen, 1898
She actually patented the wool transparency technique she had developed, and these were usually used as room dividers. She credited English designer William Morris for much of her inspiration, especially her abstracts taken from nature.
Hansen’s appeal gradually faded as Art Nouveau went out of fashion, and she spent the last five years of her life working on the St Olav wall tapestry in Norway’s oldest Cathedral, in Stavanger.
Robbie has deeply researched Hansen’s contributions to tapestry, and her workshop includes getting to know Frida Hansen as a person and artist as well as the practical application of making an open wool tapestry.