Woman's legacy enables all ranks of artists to pursue their crafts

When Denise Kavanagh set up her loom in the little gallery she founded in Geneva, she just wanted to weave while running the shop.

But what came out of that loom over the next two decades was far more than just beautiful textiles. It has produced a thriving community of artists and art students, numbering in the hundreds, who come and go for classes on 4 acres in St. Charles.

The Fine Line Creative Arts Center, which one of its faculty describes as "a best-kept secret," offers several dozen classes and workshops year-round in everything from ceramics to acrylics to "kumihimo," or Japanese braiding.

You can make knives in blacksmithing, glass beads in lampworking or textured, leaf-embedded paper out of scraps. You can learn to dye your own yarn, weave your own baskets, knit your own sweater by hand or on a frame, create your own jewelry out of copper or silver or precious metal clay.

You can do what many of The Fine Line's 700 members do -- sample.

"I threw a pot on the wheel once, and it was pretty much an unmitigated disaster," said Lynn Caldwell, director of the center and a weaving instructor. "But I'm not a potter. I'm a weaver, but you don't know until you try."

Sue Watkins tried weaving and found her niche in front of a loom, too. She's also a knitter and has taken a couple of jewelry and basket-weaving classes besides. But textile weaving satisfies most.

"The tactile feel of the fibers and the rhythm of the actual work is very peaceful," she said.

Classes in all the fine arts and crafts begin again in January, following a Christmastime break. One popular offering is oil pastels, a stick form of oil painting that has no solvents and requires no brushes.

Oil pastels make a great introduction into the art of painting, said instructor Carol Zack. "You get results almost from the day that you start," she said.

The Fine Line caters to adult artists of all ages and abilities. In Zack's painting classes there's a mix, "from people who have never painted before to people that are picking it up again to people that have been continually doing it," she said. "Everybody appreciates what each person is doing at their own level."

With sessions taught by 33 professional artists, plus guest artists who come from all over the country for one- or two-day workshops, results are often satisfying even for novices.

"The artwork that comes out of this place is phenomenal," Caldwell said. "They might have started out knowing nothing, but they take it to new levels."

"Some of my students are better than I am," said Zack, an Elgin artist with a master's degree in art education. "And there are some of the most beautiful weaving and fibers that you will see anywhere in the state of Illinois," she said, "and probably in the entire United States."

Kavanagh, who died in 2002, could never have envisioned all this when visitors to the original gallery were fascinated by the loom and asked her to teach them to weave. Within a year she had 40 students and decided to add instruction in knitting and painting.

When the gallery got too crowded, The Fine Line moved to a Geneva storefront for a few years before settling into its current home in the St. Charles countryside, a prairie-fronted farm property at the end of Twin Silos Drive.

The silos, long empty, belong to the beautifully restored barn, which houses studios, a gallery and office space, along with a pair of nuns who live upstairs. Sister Peter Julian Werner, the center's graphic artist, and Sister Geraldine McGovern, business and facility manager, joined Sister Kavanagh -- whom they knew from the School Sisters of St. Francis -- after the move was made to St. Charles in 1986.

Batavia businessman Gerald Dempsey donated the land and barn to the School Sisters of St. Francis, but "while we were started by nuns, we are not a religious affiliation," Caldwell said. "We're not connected with a church. We are our own entity."

Besides membership and class fees, the not-for-profit center is supported by donations and grants from the Illinois Arts Council and St. Charles Cultural Commission. Annual fundraisers, including a wearable art fashion show, a Christmas sale of juried pieces made by members and Raku Day -- a pottery event that allows the public to purchase bisqueware, glaze it themselves and watch while it gets fired by volunteers -- also support the center.

An $800,000 building was added in 1999 to provide more studio and gallery space. The well-manicured property tended by enthusiastic volunteers is "a little mecca" for Ed Zack, Carol's husband, who takes painting classes after work.

"When you drive into the area, because of the way the land is surrounded by all these pines, it kind of blocks out the city noises," he said. "You regroup. You can leave all of your daily worries and chores behind you."

Watkins, a retired microbiologist, also finds The Fine Line to be a "nurturing environment" with a lot of encouragement and new friendships. "I've been a widow for 15 years," she said, "and I lost my son a couple years ago, so that's kind of been my second family."

Students and their teachers, most of whom are working professionals with lengthy qualifications, come from all over the Fox Valley and beyond for the inspiration they find at the art school on the prairie.

"It's a great community up here," Caldwell said. "It's a great place to go play and nurture your creative spirit."

The Fine Line Creative Arts Center is at 6N158 Crane Road, St. Charles. For more information, call (630) 584-9443.