Skip to main content
  • Design Dawgs: BFA Alumni Clay McLaurin and Jenny Vorhoff in Georgia Magazine.

  • MFA Candidate Zahria Cook receives the 2022-2023 George Hugh Boyd Memorial Scholarship!

  • Professors Jun, Harshman and Thomloudis all receive Arts Lab Faculty Fellowships for 2022-2023!

  • Interior Design major, Abbie Alf wins first place during Idea Accelerator Demo Day

  • Professor Joe Norman receives grant from CDC to boost vaccine confidence.

  • Reserve Space with Sign-Up Genius 

  • Professors Jun, Harshman and Thomloudis all receive Arts Lab Faculty Fellowships for 2022-2023!

  • Design Dawgs: BFA Alumni Clay McLaurin and Jenny Vorhoff in Georgia Magazine.

  • MFA Candidate Zahria Cook receives the 2022-2023 George Hugh Boyd Memorial Scholarship!

  • Professor Joe Norman receives grant from CDC to boost vaccine confidence.

  • Reserve Space with Sign-Up Genius 

  • Interior Design major, Abbie Alf wins first place during Idea Accelerator Demo Day

Home
  • Connect
  • Events
    • View Calendar
    • Lecture Series
    • Submit Events
    • Upcoming Events
    • Events Archive
  • News
    • Submit News
    • Recent News
  • Give
  • Mobile Menu Extras
    • News
    • Events
    • Connect
    • Give
  • The School
    • About the School
      • Mission
      • History
      • Accreditation
      • Solidarity & Justice
      • Visit the School
      • Research
      • Board of Advisors
      • Lamar Dodd Professional Chair
      • Visiting Artist & Scholar Lectures
      • Giving Societies
    • Work at the Dodd
    • Facilities
      • Studio & Classroom Spaces
      • Art Library
      • Open Access Fabrication Labs
      • Checkout for Audio/Visual Equipment
      • Maps & Floor Plans

    Facilities

    Interior Wood Shop
    Wood Shop
  • Faculty & Staff
    • Faculty & Staff Resources
      • Faculty/Staff Resources Login
      • Forms & Links
      • Dodd Studio Support
      • Faculty/Staff Calendar
    • Faculty and Staff Directory
    • Curriculum Policies
    • Faculty Teaching & Research Awards
    • Submit
      • Submit News
      • Submit Events
      • Submit a Studio Support Request
      • Submit a Ticket to Franklin IT
      • Submit Website Edits

    Faculty News Spotlight

    .
    The School of Art Welcomes New Graduate Students
  • Alumni
    • Alumni
    • Alumni News
    • Create an Alumni Profile
    • Update Alumni Profile
    • Submit your News
    • Alumni Opportunities
    • Submit Alumni Opportunity

    Alumni News

    postcard
    Cartoline per Cortona
  • Students
    • Dodd Resources
      • Dodd Rules: COVID-19
      • Reserve Studio Space
      • Locker Request
      • Checkout for Audio/Visual Equipment
      • Dodd Studio Support
      • Open Access Fabrication Labs
      • Art Library
    • Student Organizations
      • Dodd Ambassadors
      • Association of Graduate Art Students (A.G.A.S.)
    • Student Resources
      • COVID-19 Student Resources
      • Arts Career & Entrepreneurship Space
      • Dodd Class Registration
      • Scholarships
      • Professional Practices Lectures
    • Undergraduate Academic Resources
      • Academic Advising
      • Degree Requirements
      • Minor Requirements
      • Area Portfolio Review
      • Internship Policy & Course
    • Graduate Student Profiles
      • Graduate Profile Submission
      • Update Graduate Student Profile

    Student Opportunities

    .

    View Student Opportunities

    Submit a Student Opportunity

  • Galleries
    • Dodd Galleries
      • Online Exhibitions
      • Current Exhibitions
      • Upcoming Exhibitions
      • Past Exhibitions
      • Performances & Talks
      • Propose an Exhibition
    • The Athenaeum
      • About The Athenaeum

    Exhibition Spotlight

    BFA

    EMERGENCE: BFA Exit Show Fall 2021

    Margie E. West Gallery
    December 2021
  • Academics
    • Graduate Programs
      • Admissions
      • Funding & Research Support
      • MA
      • MAEd
      • MFA
      • PhD in Art with Emphasis in Art Education
      • PhD in Art with Emphasis in Art History
      • EdS in Art Education
      • Graduate Student Handbook
    • Undergraduate Programs
      • Degree Options
      • Minors in Art & Art History
      • Studio Art Core
      • Admissions
    • Study Abroad & Field Study
      • Cortona
      • NYC Maymester Program
      • Costa Rica
      • Ghana
    • Research
      • Visiting Artist & Scholar Lectures
      • Lamar Dodd Professional Chair
      • Dodd Interdisciplinary Fellows
      • Research Days
      • Ideas for Creative Exploration
      • Social Ecology Lab
      • The Willson Center for Humanities & Arts
      • a2ru
      • Art & Educaiton for Social Justice Symposium 2020

    Areas of Study

    •  

      Art Education

    •  

      Art History

    •  

      Ceramics

    •  

      Drawing and Painting

    •  

      Fabric Design

    •  

      Graphic Design

    •  

      Interdisciplinary Art & Design

    •  

      Interior Design

    •  

      Jewelry and Metalwork

    •  

      Photography

    •  

      Printmaking and Book Arts

    •  

      Scientific Illustration

    •  

      Sculpture

    •  

      Studio Art Core

Crafting a career through nature and art: Interdisciplinary art student Jay Reddish

Individual outdoors smiling while holding up a brown dress with natural dyes
Log in to post comments

Kristen Morales, Communications Director, Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources

Botanical prints and natural dyes propel undergraduate to pursue environmental education 

Jay Reddish holds up a designer knit dress. The colorful leaf patterns imprinted on its fabric, along with the wool fibers that create its structure, are tangible evidence of the path Reddish found to the University of Georgia. 
 
From shoulders to hem, shapes of black walnut and water oak leaves mingle with native grape vines. Nearly all were foraged by Reddish, then arranged on the dress, rolled up tight and boiled in a vat spiked with black walnut leaves and goldenrod flowers in a process called eco-printing. 

The blending of art and nature on the dress represent how Reddish is also combining aspects of their dual major at UGA: parks, recreation and tourism management at the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources and interdisciplinary art at the Lamar Dodd School of Art. It’s a way to blend a lifelong love of sewing, printmaking and creating with a passion for sustainability and wonder for the world around us. 
 
This blending of science and art makes perfect sense to Reddish—but they understand how folks might not immediately connect the two. 

Mended blue jeans

Detail view of patchwork. 

 

“I think folks don’t generally make that connection, because they’re coming at textile arts and natural resources from two different places. It’s almost the conservation vs. preservation discussion we’ve all had,” said Reddish. “How do we want to maintain these resources? Do we want to interact with them through use, or do we want to interact with them by keeping them safe and preserving them?” 

 

While some students find forestry and conservation through hunting, hiking or fishing, Reddish found the field through a love of plants and earth skills. For example, the inner bark of a tulip poplar tree can be corded into rope. Acorns can feed wildlife, but they can also be ground into flour and their husks used as a natural dye. 

For nearly all their life, Reddish has been making things, foraging for natural objects or learning how to mend and reuse items that might otherwise be destined for the landfill. When they were 3, they sat with their mother—an artistic quiltmaker—and learned to stitch. “I’m from a family of mechanics and seamstresses,” added Reddish. “With time, I started learning the names of the different embroidery stitches. ... I was 5 when I got my first sewing machine.” 

Growing up, Reddish’s mother ran a quilting store that traveled to shows and conferences. They and their younger sister would serve as her assistants, running the store when their mother was teaching a class. Because of the schedule, the siblings were homeschooled—or, as Reddish puts it, unschooled, which meant their mother followed a curriculum set by her children’s interests. 

A patch knitted on a vintage wool sweater to fix a hole.

A patch knitted on a vintage wool sweater to fix a hole.

 

“She would find all these different resources for us, whatever we were excited about,” they said. “So, for me, that was beekeeping and falconry and fiber arts and making your own clothes and leather tanning and homesteading and permaculture and living off the grid—all of these fairy tales and fantasy books I’d been reading in my childhood.” 

 

This exploration led the family to attend earth skills gatherings, where experts from all walks of life would gather to teach in natural settings. A day’s schedule might include a mother teaching how to make homemade yogurt, a forest ecology professor teaching about silvicultural practices for small-scale landowners or an instructor with Native American heritage teaching basket weaving.  
 
It was at these gatherings of artists, scientists and educators where Reddish launched their first business: handmade patches. (Reddish redrew illustrations from their antique science textbooks and printed them onto their mother’s leftover fabric scraps.) It was also at these gatherings where they met alumni from UGA, specifically Warnell, and began to learn about careers that involved environmental education. 

“I just started hearing more about Warnell and environmental educators who work in more structured fields,” they said. “I never thought you could work in a structured field and get to do the stuff I loved, and that’s when I thought, I could get an art degree or I could get a degree from Warnell, where all these cool people work. And I’ll get a really cool job and I’ll incorporate these things I love into it.” 
 
That was the original plan, anyway. But after transferring to Warnell—Reddish graduated early from high school after dual-enrolling in a local community college and came to UGA as a junior—they realized art had to be in the cards. So, they applied to the interdisciplinary art program.  
 
Their portfolio included, among other pieces, a hand-printed coat, embroidery created from castoff sweaters that had been unraveled and dyed to create new embellishments and patchwork pants that blend art and sustainability.

 A handwoven ecoprinted coat

A handmade coat was part of Jay Reddish’s portfolio when applying to UGA’s Lamar Dodd School of Art. The coat features seam reinforcements made from card-woven strips, eco-printed cloth and lace embellishments that were sourced from sweaters.

 

“I realized I’m not happy unless I’m making things,” they added. “It helps me remember and keep focused on how important that is to me, and not just the academics of park management.” 

 

So, as each semester rolls around, Reddish builds their schedule with parks and recreation management classes as the scaffolding. Then, they fit in art classes that fulfill the requirements for their exit show, which will likely involve some form of textiles. 
 
On top of all this, Reddish also manages their own business, Forest Troll Art, and works with an Athens-area summer educational program that incorporates art and nature for children. The Warnell classes, Lamar Dodd classes, business and summer work all connect in one way or another—or, Reddish finds ways to connect them. 
 
That’s the joy and challenge of the dual degree, they said.  

"So, if there’s something I’m doing for the arts school that I can combine with Forest Troll Art, I will do it. Even if I can’t get Warnell and Lamar Dodd to come together on a synchronous path, I can always figure out a way to get the project and the learning to interact with my own projects.” 

Reddish plans to graduate in spring 2023. In the meantime, they are taking classes in patternmaking and screenprinting, incorporating videos from their TikTok channel into class projects about parks and recreation or environmental education and creating personal projects to help with their studies.  
 
Sometimes the combinations make for unusual conversations in class, and that’s OK. Reddish is pushing the envelope and seeing the world in a different way.

Categories
Student News
Academic Area
Interdisciplinary Art & Design

More Dodd News

Jun 23, 2022
Professional headshot of Joseph Peragine in black shirt set against white backdrop

Joseph Peragine Named Director of the Lamar Dodd School of Art

Jun 22, 2022
Still life painting by Margaret Morrison of household objects set against a dark tan backdrop

Painting by Professor Margaret Morrison Featured in Traveling Exhibit Organized by Georgia Museum of Art and Lyndon House

Jun 20, 2022
The completed quilt from the Linnentown Quilt Project lays on a table on April 10, 2022 at the Georgia Museum of Art in Athens, Georgia. The quilt features 86 squares and various materials. (Photo/Maddy Franklin)

Art Education Graduate Students Spearhead Linnentown Quilt Project

Jun 14, 2022
Individual outdoors smiling while holding up a brown dress with natural dyes

Crafting a career through nature and art: Interdisciplinary art student Jay Reddish

Footer Menu 1

  • Academics
  • UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMS
  • Degree Options
  • Studio Art Core
  • GRADUATE PROGRAMS
    • MA
    • MFA
    • MAEd
    • PhD Art Education
    • PhD Art History
    • Funding & Research Support
  • Admissions
  • Studies Abroad & Field Study

Footer Menu 2

  • Galleries
    • Current Exhibitons
    • Past Exhibitions
    • Performances & Talks
    • Propose an Exhibitions
    • BFA Exhibition Guidelines

Footer Meun 4

  • Faculty & Staff
    • Faculty & Staff Resources
    • Curriculum Policies
    • Forms & Links
    • Dodd Studio Support
  • Graduate Students
  • Alumni
    • Create an Alumni Profile
    • Alumni Opportunities

Footer 3

  • Dodd Resources
  • Equipment Checkout
    • Open Access Fabrication Labs
    • Dodd Studio Support
  • Student Resources
    • Scholarships
  • Academic Advising
    • Degree Requirements
    • Minor Requirements
    • Area Portfolio Review
    • Internship Policy & Course
  • Student Opportunities
    • Submit an Opportunity for Students

Footer Menu 5

  • Facilities
    • Request a Meeting Space
  • Studio & Classroom Spaces
    • Thomas Street Art Complex
    • Art Library
    • Open Access Fabrication Labs
    • Maps & Floor Plans
  • Research
    • Visit the School
    • Board of Visitors
    • Visiting Artists & Scholars
    • Work at the Dodd
  • View Calendar

Footer Submit Menu

  • ALL FORMS AND LINKS
  • Event/Calendar Submission
  • Instructor Override Request Form
  • POD Request Form
  • Website Update

Franklin_A&S-FS-CW-(1)-websize.png

Lamar Dodd School of Art
University of Georgia
270 River Road
Athens, GA 30602

706.542.1511
706.542.0226 Fax

CONTACT US

Privacy Policy | © 2020 Lamar Dodd School of Art, University of Georgia. All rights reserved.

Login  |  UGA Master Calendar  |  www.uga.edu                          website feedback