Storyteller Barbara Jurgs Koppang created her Oddest Goddess Art Dolls as another wonderful way to weave a tale.  Each doll is unique and expresses a connection to the spiritual aspects of life.  The faces bear the wrinkles of a lifetime of experience and reflect her favorite quote from a song by Leonard Cohen:  “There is a crack in everything, that is how the light gets in.”

Barbara decided to make a talisman...an everyday Goddess... to remind women that beauty originates inside. 

The Storyteller-Artist starts by making the bodies of the dolls with old sweaters that evoke the warmth and comfort of friends.  Faces and hands are sculpted out of cold porcelain, which Barbara works adding detail after detail until the porcelain is completely dry, sometimes for up to a week.   Semi-precious gemstones are handset for the eyes.  The dolls are filled to the brim with all the "scraps" leftover from sewing and cutting the bodies...just as we are filled with the memories and experiences of life.  She adds vintage trims, beads, and other unique embellishments, along with a felt heart, representing the source of a person’s true beauty.  The doll is sewn together stitch by stitch to symbolize walking a life moment by moment and savoring that passage of time. 

The Oddest Goddess, aka Barbara Jurgs Koppang, can be found selling her dolls at various art and fiber shows around the country. She has been found at the American Craft Council Shows in St Paul, MN and San Francisco, CA, as well as the Midwest Fiber and Folk Art show in Greys Lake, IL. She will attending the first Artist Doll & Teddy Bear Convention May 12-14 in Philadelphia this year (2011), as well as many other art shows in the Midwest.

This Goddess has a bird in her arms!