ART
RAGS Wearable Art
Final Exhibit
DeGroot’s Dazzling Display
When the thirtieth annual RAGS Wearable Art Sale and Gallery Competition kicks off this year with a ticketed VIP presale event on Thursday, March 7th, Cheryl DeGroot will again be among the artists represented. She was present for the first show, and she’ll be there for this last hurrah, displaying her sterling silver and mixed metal jewelry. DeGroot has been working exclusively as a jewelry designer and fabricator for the past twenty years, having begun production work in 1987. Her long career commenced with classes she took at Bremerton’s Olympic College in 1969. “I always wanted to learn how to make jewelry,” she says.
A longtime resident of South Tacoma, Cheryl grew up in Silverdale, the daughter on a logger, “He had a shop where he bought and sold surplus stuff from the Navy yard,” she says of her dad. “And I’d always be wandering around his shop looking for things I could make jewelry out of.” When she saw the college was offering the classes, she “went right down there. Like, Yes!”
Though she once employed production assistants, DeGroot has scaled back to become a one-woman operation. In the decades before, however, she worked a dizzying variety of other jobs, including a taxi driver and assistant chimney sweep. After a three-year stint spent fishing in Alaska, she found herself divorced and back in Washington, “out by Mount Rainier,” with a need to again support herself.
After learning to weld at Clover Park, she found a position at Tacoma Boat. “That was quite an experience working with some pretty tough guys.” But the smoke made her ill, so she sought work outdoors as a ship fitter and as a rigger. Eventually, she connected with renowned artist David Keyes and began teaching jewelry-making and “figuring out production work. in ‘69, everyone was doing one-of-a-kind work. I do a few one-of-a-kind pieces now, but production work is where the money is.”
She does that work out of her cozy Tacoma home studio, participating in shows as far away as Montana as well as selling her work at the Seattle Art Museum and LeRoy Jewelers here in Tacoma, among other places. And, of course, she’ll be at this year’s gala for the popular RAGS Wearable Art Sale and YWCA fundraiser, which returns for its thirtieth and final event.
Since 1994, in support of YWCA Pierce County’s domestic violence programs and services, RAGS has raised over $2.2 million and showcased over 675 artists and small-business owners, given more than $34,000 in awards to top artists, and served more than 7,300 online visitors and shoppers.
Beautiful jewelry, creative clothing and distinctive accessories from more than seventy artists of local, regional and national acclaim are offered for sale at the juried, boutique-style show. Besides this marketplace sale, RAGS also features a gallery of unique works, with winners in several categories earning cash rewards. Artists give one-third of sale revenues to RAGS to benefit the YWCA’s domestic violence intervention programs.
“The RAGS Guild is honored to have been the driving force behind such an impactful event these past 30 years,” explains RAGS Chair Amanda McGinn, “and the decision to end it after this coming March was not one that was made lightly. We are looking forward to honoring and celebrating the achievements of our artists, shoppers and volunteers who have contributed so much to RAGS and YWCA Pierce County over the last three decades.”
DeGroot has pondered the end of RAGS’s long, productive run. Why is it ending? “That’s a good question,” she says. “I suppose it’s run its course. Thirty years is a long time to run a show. It’s a year-round project.”
The show is open to the public at no charge at Mercedes-Benz of Tacoma, just off Interstate 5 in Fife, at 1701 Alexander Ave E. Show hours are Friday and Saturday March 8 and 9, from 10am to 6pm, and Sunday March 10 from 10am to 3pm. Tickets for the March 7th VIP Presale event, at $100 per person, may be purchased at ragswearableart.org.