Ann Morton of Madison, Uptown Phoenix on Life, Lessons & Legacy

We recently had the chance to connect with Ann Morton and have shared our conversation below.

Good morning Ann, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: What’s more important to you—intelligence, energy, or integrity?
Integrity. Without that as your foundation, nothing else matters. There are plenty of intelligent, energetic people that have no integrity.

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I am an artist, educator and social practitioner whose work exploits traditional textile techniques as conceptual tools for aesthetic, social communication to examine a society of which we are all a part – as bystanders, participants, victims and perpetrators.

I am driven by a desire to employ my art as a voice for advocacy. The work I do reflects my own hand work, but also orchestrates the hand work from a wide variety of community participants through public interventions that seek to harness the power in the act of making for social purpose and to engage the hands of many to create a larger whole.

After a 35+ year professional career as a graphic/environmental graphic designer, I earned my MFA in 2012 from Arizona State University’s Herberger Institute – School of Art. Currently, I am a practicing artist and instructor at Mesa Community College – previously at Arizona State University and Paradise Valley Community College in metropolitan Phoenix. Selected works are currently represented by Lisa Sette Gallery in Phoenix, AZ.

Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What was your earliest memory of feeling powerful?
In kindergarten, we listened to Sergei Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf”. Each character was portrayed by the sound of a different instrument, which I found so fascinating, even at age 5. We were given one of the characters for which to invent and make a hand puppet. I got the “grandfather”, and the sense of accomplishment I felt in making that puppet still resonates today. (And by the way, fast forward to 6th grade when I took up playing the bassoon, the instrument that characterized the grandfather in that piece of music all those years before.)

Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
Hmmm – daily? As an artist, there is no playbook. The hardest time is that space when you are formulating what you will make – and what your intention is in making it. It is during those times that it would be easy to give up – until you truly contemplate the alternative.

Next, maybe we can discuss some of your foundational philosophies and views? What truths are so foundational in your life that you rarely articulate them?
There is another realm of reality in which everything in our world is in complete perfection. In our day to day, especially in these times, it is hard to see or hold onto that fact, but I’ve experienced it, and it is something I can always go back to – (especially on those days that I feel like giving up).

Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. If you knew you had 10 years left, what would you stop doing immediately?
Ha Ha – I do probably only have 10 years left! – or not many more than that. Funny how your perspective changes. Curiously, you realize that things aren’t as important as you thought, but at the same time, everything is important to take note of.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.annmortonaz.com/index.html https://www.violetprotest.com/ https://www.toward2050az.com/
• Instagram: @annmortonaz
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ann-morton-606753b/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/annmortonaz
• Other: Ravelry – https://www.ravelry.com/people/anninfibers

Image Credits
My Head Shot: Photo Credit – Courtesy of Desert Botanical Garden, Polymath Photography

Violet Protest overhead US: Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography
Ground Cover Aerial: Photo Credit – Todd Photographic
Toward 2050 overall: Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography
When I’m 64 overall – 108″ X 40″ X 70″ (approx.) : Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography
Proof Reading Series – each cloth 12″ x 12″ : Photo Credit – Ann Morton
US|THEM – 24 1/2″ x 24″ (on panel) : Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography
New Vocabulary – 44″ x 56″ : Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography
Voluntary Protective Action – 53″ x 76″ : Photo Credit – Bill Timmerman, Timmerman Photography