Bucks County Artist Barbara Moon Boertzel’s First Museum Retrospective, Listening to Time, Premieres a New Artist Book Trilogy at Michener Art Museum

DOYLESTOWN, PA (October 6, 2026)—Barbara Moon Boertzel: Listening to Time, the first museum retrospective of New Hope, Pa., artist and educator Barbara Moon Boertzel, is on view at Michener Art Museum from Saturday, October 24, 2026, through Sunday, April 18, 2027.

The exhibition surveys more than four decades of Boertzel's handmade paper and direct drawing stitchery, a technique of drawing with needle and thread, and culminates in the debut of a new artist book trilogy.

The trilogy, I Listen to the Passage of Time, represents the full range of disciplines the fiber and book artist has mastered in her career. Boertzel records her latest observations in Japanese handbound journals filled with stitched cloth, monoprints, photographs, and tropical fiber paper she made by hand on the island of Guam in the 1980s.

“Fiber connects everything she makes, from slow stitching to papermaking to handbound books,” said Michener Art Museum Assistant Curator Abi Lua, who curated the exhibition. “For Barbara, the artist book is the perfect container for each element, and the perfect expression of her artistic practice. Every page reflects her sustained attention toward her surroundings, her inner state, and the process of making art itself.”

The first known tropical fiber papermaker in the western Pacific, Boertzel was also drawing with needle and thread long before textiles drew wide attention in art and academic spaces. She has worked in direct drawing stitchery since the 1990s, making her an early practitioner of the mindful, contemplative approach to textile art now known as slow stitch.

Throughout her career, Boertzel approached the act of making as a form of meditation, ranging across disciplines but always seeking to capture moments of time. Each of the 16 works on view records a moment that drew her attention, from the life cycle of a zinnia, a swell of a river vortex, to the rhythms of a woman setting the table.

Through her choice of subject, medium, and method, Boertzel contemplates the fleeting nature of time and, simultaneously, the fullness of a single moment. In the handbound book Hurrying Slowly, time is measured literally, with time stamps in ink for how long it took to make each page. In many works, Boertzel builds geometric fields of marks using only the running stitch; the simple, repeated motion allows her to remain present to the process of making.

“I’ve learned that process is as important as product. The product is merely a trace of the journey,” Boertzel said. “I hope to inspire the viewer to slow down, be in the moment, and look more closely.”

The exhibition ranges from intimate pages to large-scale textiles. Visitors can explore Boertzel’s new trilogy in full through a video presentation that turns through every page of the three books. In Lines of the Hand (1994), delicate strips of stitched cotton organdy and Japanese paper stretch nearly five feet tall but only two and a half inches wide, while Movement in Stillness (1993–94), the largest work on view, is a hand-stitched Polish linen that spans more than five and a half feet.

“Craft has always been central to the Michener’s story, and presenting Barbara’s handmade paper, stitched textiles, and artist books is a remarkable addition to that legacy,” said Michener Art Museum Executive Director and CEO Anne Corso. “In a world that moves so quickly, Listening to Time is an invitation to linger and spend time together in the galleries.”

The exhibition Barbara Moon Boertzel: Listening to Time in the Bette and Nelson Pfundt Gallery is presented by Vivian Banta and Robert Field.

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Related Exhibition Programming for Barbara Moon Boertzel: Listening to Time, on view October 24, 2026–April 18, 2027:

Exhibition Opening Day

Saturday, October 24

Museum Hours: 10 a.m.–5 p.m.

Meet the Artist: 12–2 p.m.

Free for Members • General admission applies

Beyond Words Book Club

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

Daytime: Thursday, January 28, 2027 • 1–2:30 p.m.

Evening: Thursday, February 11, 2027 • 6:30–8 p.m.

$10 Members • $22 Non-Members

Barbara Moon Boertzel: My Artistic Journey

Wednesday, February 10, 2027 • 1–2 p.m.

Snow date: Wednesday, February 17, 2027 • 1–2 p.m.

$10 Members • $22 Non-Members

Barbara Moon Boertzel: Explorations in Papermaking

Wednesday, March 10, 2027 • 1–2 p.m.

Snow date: Wednesday, March 17, 2027 • 1–2 p.m.

$10 Members • $22 Non-Members

Free Second Sundays

Free admission on the Second Sunday of the month, with support from Art Bridges Foundation, runs through Sunday, December 13, 2026. Second Sunday free admission includes access to Barbara Moon Boertzel: Listening to Time and all exhibitions on view.

Sunday, November 8 • 12–5 p.m.

Sunday, December 13 • 12–5 p.m.

About the Artist

Barbara Moon Boertzel is an artist and educator based in New Hope, Pennsylvania. She received her BA from The George Washington University/Corcoran School of Art and MA from the University of Guam in Painting, Drawing, and Printmaking. She later received an MFA in Fiber Arts/Textiles from Cranbrook Academy of Art. From 1973 to 1989, Boertzel lived on Guam, where she researched Micronesian fiber arts and traveled to Japan for traditional hand papermaking study, creating handmade paper from tropical fibers. She received the 1985 Governor’s Award for the Arts in Crafts from the Territory of Guam. After graduate school, drawing with thread and bookmaking became central components of Boertzel’s textile and paper artworks, resulting in intimate and meditative pieces across various media.

Boertzel’s work has been exhibited at the Detroit Focus Gallery (1992); Southwest School of Art & Craft, San Antonio (2000); Skidmore College (2002); Meraviglia: Innovations in the Book Arts, Lafayette College (2006); and Bucks County Community College (2012), as well as in Guam, Saipan, Hawaii, Tahiti, and Japan (1983–88). Her teaching roles have included the Guam Council on the Arts & Humanities and the University of Guam.

About Michener Art Museum

Address: 138 South Pine Street, Doylestown PA 18901

Website: michenerartmuseum.org

Hours: Wednesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. and Sunday, 12–5 p.m.

Holiday Hours: The Museum is closed for Thanksgiving Day on Thursday, November 26, but open on Friday, November 27. The Museum is closed for Christmas Day on Friday, December 25, but open Thursday, December 24, Saturday, December 26 and Sunday, December 27. The Museum is closed for New Year’s Day on Friday, January 1, but open on Thursday, December 31 for New Year’s Eve.

Michener Art Museum is dedicated to preserving, interpreting, and exhibiting the art and cultural heritage of the Delaware Valley region. The Museum is named for Doylestown’s most famous son James A. Michener, a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and supporter of the arts. Home to a world-class collection of Pennsylvania Impressionist paintings and a permanent collection that explores a variety of artistic expressions, the Michener has a reputation for its craft holdings, which includes the Nakashima Reading Room. The Museum is housed on the site of the 1884 Bucks County Jail and is surrounded by the original prison walls, now part of the Patricia D. Pfundt Sculpture Garden. Michener Art Museum offers wide-ranging programming that nurtures a lifelong involvement in the arts, with rotating special exhibitions, artist conversations and studio tours, gallery talks, the Putman Arts Leader Lecture series, as well as dance and music performances.

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