Artists in Conversation: A Mother–Daughter Story of Craft, Place, and Creative Thinking

If you wander through the Confederation Centre Art Gallery this fall, you may come across two artworks that seem to have nothing to do with each other—yet feel uncannily linked. There’s a lush, digitally designed quilt by Maggie J. Whitten-Henry in the exhibition Undergrowth, and, elsewhere in A New Definition of Home, Jane Whitten’s sculptural seaweed and lichen forms, as if just left behind by the tide.

Nothing on the walls suggests any connection between them. But what the labels don’t reveal is the real story: Maggie and Jane are mother and daughter.

Creativity in the Air

In the Whitten household, creativity wasn’t optional; it simply happened. Jane grew up steeped in art, her father was a research biologist, her relatives worked in the Victorian-era Australian arts scene, and handmade craft was part of daily life. When she became a mother herself, she raised her children in a home that looked a lot like her own childhood: yarn in baskets, wire on tables, dye pots simmering beside dinner.

Maggie grew up with an art teacher for a father while watching people drift in and out of the house to talk about exhibitions or buy pieces. Selling handmade cards as a kid didn’t feel entrepreneurial—it felt natural. Still, she didn’t knit at first. Watching her mother knit at almost comical speed was enough to scare off any beginner. Knitting found her later, during long trips, when her hands needed something to do.

On her father’s side, creativity looked more eccentric: architectural lettering, a philosopher uncle who invented a drawing machine out of war leftovers. You could say curiosity was inherited; it was certainly practiced.

Two Rhythms in Constant Conversation

Even now, living separate creative lives, their workspaces are connected by messages, photos, and mid-project questions. “What do you think of this blue?” “Too much texture?” It’s not formal collaboration so much as a lifelong conversation.

Their minds work differently. Maggie’s creativity loops and spirals, ideas coming back around the way a good joke does. She improvises, lets things mutate, follows sparks when they arrive.

“You really can do it. You don’t have to be perfect. It can be accessible—you don’t need a lot of planning or materials; you just have fun with it.” – Maggie

Jane works through repetition: knitting, coiling, wrapping wire. The rhythm is calming; the design happens in her head while her hands move automatically, usually to the soundtrack of audiobooks at 1.8x speed.

One artist improvises. The other builds steadily. Together, their differences make a kind of harmony.

Landscapes, Materials, and Memory

Jane’s work is shaped by coastlines, Maine, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, places where rock and ocean meet with little softness. Her sculptures mimic seaweed, lichens, and tidal forms, but are made of wire, clippings, and discarded materials as well as natural fibres.

“I try to make something familiar so people aren’t threatened by it. Then they look closer and realize it’s made from discarded materials, and start to see how important the environment is—we need to be better stewards of it, and we need to do it now.” – Jane

Maggie’s quilt draws from memory instead: houses she lived in, everyday textures, moments photographed and reimagined. The backing fabric was dyed by Jane with plants from her garden, a quiet collaboration stitched into the work.

What They Hope You Feel

Both artists want viewers to feel welcome. Jane hopes her familiar forms spark gentle conversations about the environment. Maggie hopes her quilt encourages people to find their own memories in its layers.

Side by side, their exhibitions read like two chapters of one story, a family shaped by place, craft, and the easy, ongoing conversation of making things together.

Interviewer: Jillian O’Halloran : Manager, Communications | Confederation Centre of the Arts