Yarn art hugs SCCC trees

NEWTON — Two years ago, Lauren Bell took a photojournalism class with instructor Joe Guerriero at Sussex County Community College.

In the class, students had to create a series of images for a mock-up story as their final. Bell decided to do her first yarn art. Two years later, her latest yarn creation will be on display for a few more weeks.

"I knew I wanted to turn the pieces into blankets, but I didn't know what I would do with them," Bell said of her first yarn art. "The process was such a success that I decided to do something more targeted which is how the Veterans Day project came about."

This year's disassembled yarn art will provide1 8 blankets for Veterans.

Bell learned to crochet at a young age, while growing up in Ogdensburg, with a few different people teaching her.

"I didn't really get into it until high school," she said.

She really got into it to the point where she considered opening a baking/crochet business. Since then, she's transitioned into cultural/heritage/museum post-production imaging as a career.

"I still love to crochet in my spare time," she said.

After graduating from Wallkill Valley Regional High school in 2009, Bell went to SCCC as part of the STARS program and earned her AS degree in Business Administration. She then transferred to Fairleigh Dickinson University in 2011 to get her BS degree in Business Administration. While at FDU, she took art classes whenever she could at SCCC to earn her AFA in Photography, which will be complete this winter.

"Photography has always been a passion of mine, so I wanted to learn more about it but also wanted to have the business knowledge," she said.

The yarn art project in 2013 was proposed, approved and completed in a few short months.

"It took a lot of time to crochet the pieces and then convert them into blankets for the donation. Since I knew a larger timeline was necessary, I proposed the Veterans Day project November 2014 and got approval from the college. I've been working on the 18 tree pieces over the past year and plan to have them converted into blankets (along with more blankets) to donate by March 2016."

The yarn art will be disassembled on the morning of Nov. 22 by Bell and her parents. The pieces are held onto the trees with ties, so they will need only to just cut them off carefully, making sure not to cut the yarn.

"If the yarn is cut, the pieces will come apart and need to have a completely new crocheted section inserted," she said. As of yet, Bell is not certain which veterans organization will take the blankets, but she said SCCC Veterans Services Coodinator Mike Devilliers has an idea in mind.

Since making the yarn art, Bell has moved to Corning, N.Y., where she has a job at the Corning Museum of Glass. She will return for the disassembly, and wants to thank those who helped her with the install at SCCC:

Joe Guerriero, adjunct photography professor at SCCC, who lives in the Newton/Stillwater area, her motherr, Mary Bell, her dad, Gene Bell, both of Ogdensburg, and Sheryl Dekmar, her aunt from Wantage, who is also a crocheter and who will help her make the conversion from yarn art to the blankets.