The very first time Eboni Bellott wove, she was in the third grade making a placemat out of construction paper.
Bellott didn’t get her hands on a loom until she was an undergraduate at Eastern Illinois University.
“I’m a person that likes to do repetitive things,” Bellott said. “I find that fun.”
Bellott began to study fabrics and methods, develop a style, and find satisfaction in her finished projects.
She took every class on weaving she could at Eastern, where she graduated in 2005 with a concentration in textiles.
But when she entered the workforce, she did not have the time or the equipment to continue her craft on her own.
Then Bellott moved to Macomb and got married about ten years ago.
“My husband, on our wedding day, got me a big eight-harness floor loom, as a wedding present,” Bellott said.
She immediately started a project on her new loom, but not long after, she found out she was pregnant. She stopped weaving again when her belly got too big with her first child.
Bellott is now a mother of three, and motherhood pushed weaving to the side, until she was asked about a year ago to show her work at Carl Sandburg College.
Now, she finds the time and said she’s been cranking out art.
“For the most part, I try to get the majority of my weaving done at night, after my kids go to bed,” Bellott said. “Then I’ll stay up way too late, and then I get excited and stay up even later.”
Bellott said she’s not much for neutral colors in her work.
So the first-ever solo exhibition of her work is called “Vivid Interlacing.”
It’s on display through March 20 in the Lonnie Eugene Stewart Art Gallery in Building D on Sandburg’s main campus in Galesburg.
The show features woven pieces including a tote bag, a guitar strap, purses, a bath mat, scarves, pillows, a shawl she made for her mother, and a baby blanket she made for a friend.
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