Françoise Barnes

Françoise Barnes is a French-born, New Mexico-based artist known primarily as a quiltmaker though her practice includes painting, printmaking, and mixed media work. She has also been active in Ohio and Colorado. After immigrating to the United States, Barnes began designing quilts and was involved in the recognition of quiltmaking as an art form. She is represented in the collections of the Smithsonian Museum of American History, among others, and was a co-founder of the "Quilt National" biennial in Athens, Ohio in 1979 with fellow quilters Harriet Anderson, Nancy Crow, and Virginia Randles. The Quilt National is still held to this day, and has traveled across the country to various museums over the years.