Jacqueline Hart Gibson, Gilpin County. Local mosaic artist, Julie Ikler, hosted a reception for her beautiful and unique pieces at the Gilpin Library on April 6, 2019. The exhibit will remain until May 25, 2019, with pieces available for purchase as well as for viewing and enjoying.

Friends and members of the community showed up to support Julie’s presentation. Her gently spirited grandchildren played in the foyer, stopping to ask, “Can I take one of these?” about Julie’s business cards, or to report that a snack had somehow ended up on the floor. Julie’s son, Elliot, appeared joyful and reported that he was “so proud of her.”

When asked about her recently discovered passion, Julie stated, “I have found what I never knew I always wanted to do.”

Julie grew up in Illinois, where she nurtured her love of photography and art. She studied graphic design, typography, photography and drawing at the American Academy of Art in Chicago. She went on to study weaving and textile art in California at the College of Marin. It was when she moved to Colorado in the 80s that art had to take a back seat as she raised her children.

Often art is a desire that refuses to be ignored, manifesting itself when a seemingly unrelated opportunity arises. The seeds for Julie’s current creative endeavor were planted years earlier when an heirloom bowl fell and broke in her home. The bowl had belonged to her mother who had passed, and she could not simply discard the pieces of an item so meaningful. She stored the remaining shards, until a mosaic class offered in the Lifelong Learning Catalog from BVSD inspired Julie to re-create the bowl into something new.

The sunroom in Julie’s home was transformed into a studio. An old foosball table, no longer needed as her children were grown, became a workbench. Remnants from the once shattered family heirloom, became part of the first completed mosaic in Julie’s collection.

The collection currently showing at the Gilpin Library includes the mosaic that allowed Julie’s “heart and hands” to return to her art. Other pieces include a floral dedication to Barbara Lawlor and their shared love of gardening, and many more. The exhibit is open to the public during regular operating hours at the Gilpin Library.

(Originally published in the April 11, 2019, print edition of The Mountain-Ear.)