Walking in the garden of earthly delights
Published 8:30 am Thursday, May 7, 2026
This year’s Homer Wearable Arts Show, held twice on the evening of the full flower moon on Friday at the Porcupine Theater, featured several local fiber artists’ interpretations of a 15th-century painting which Kari Multz, owner of The Fringe and one of the participating designers, called “a celebration of humanity.”
The Wearable Arts Show is sponsored by the Homer Fiber Arts Collective and has been an annual tradition in Homer since the 1980s, though this year marks the first that the show was held in the spring rather than the fall. Friday’s event also marked the second year that community members were able to share the runway with the featured designers.
Local designers featured this year included Elise Schinsky of Lucid Lynz Designs; Carly Garay; Heidi Catlett of Deja New; Chelsa May; Ann-Margret Wimmerstedt; Beth Carroll; and Multz herself. Each artist presented their own interpretation through various fiber arts mediums of “The Garden of Earthly Delights,” an oil painting by 15th century Dutch master Hieronymus Bosch.
“Each artist had their own music and an artist statement, and they featured three different models wearing their clothing,” Multz said Tuesday. “It was very much a show that was honoring the fiber artist and letting them give you an in-depth look of what goes into the making of their clothing and how they interpreted the theme.
“It was very powerful — very, very cool.…The vignettes from each artist had a very different flavor.”
Multz, Garay and Schinsky also served as artistic directors and producers of the show.
The show kicked off with a surprise as members of a local rollerskating group, adorned with flower crowns, leapt off the stage and skated around the theater to drum up audience enthusiasm.
“Everybody was hooting and hollering … that got the energy really going,” Multz said. “We also had some of the Sea Legs stilt (troupe). Our emcee was Gabrielle Martin, and she wrote a beautiful script about the wearable arts and the history, and how things are kind of changing for us as younger, newer artists are joining our group.”
Several audience members also came garbed in handmade clothing and took advantage of the opportunity to share the runway.
“The first show, we had about 17 people that got up and walked with us. The second show, there were over 30, close to 40 people that got up and walked,” Multz said. “In each of those groups, somebody won a cash prize. We had judges this year, which is something we don’t typically do, but we did that so that the artists could make a little money from their efforts.”
Multz won the prize for the first runway show on Friday. Schinsky won a prize in the second show of the evening. Two community members also won prizes.
Multz said that whether the Wearable Arts Show will continue being held in the spring or return to being held in the fall remains to be determined.
“A lot of people really enjoyed having it at this time,” she said.
Proceeds from this year’s show benefited Bunnell Street Arts Center.
