Neva Waldt's Bio

"My earliest childhood memory was a stuffed doll I received at 2 years of age. At 5, I was designing and painting my own paper dolls, and have loved dolls ever since. For me, the process is the reward. I am fascinated by detail, color, textures and gesture. My works tend to be very illustrative and some even thought provoking."

After obtaining a degree in Fine Arts from Sam Houston State University in 1976, Neva spent the next 25 years as a graphic designer in Houston, Texas. In 2002, she traded in her mouse for needle and thread and began her next career as an original doll artist.

Neva became a member of The Material Girls Cloth Doll Club in 2003 and a member of Texas Association of Original Doll Artists in 2004. She has now shown her dolls at the Houston International Quilt Festival’s Celebration of the Doll exhibit, the Santa Fe International Figurative Art show in 2004, and the Kansas City Doll Fair in 2005. At the KCDF, her first juried show, she was awarded Best of Show-Cloth in the Non-professional category for her doll "Del Rio." She has had work published in Soft Dolls and Animals, Doll Crafter and Costuming and Art Doll Quarterly. Neva works primarily in cloth, but is experimenting with a variety of different mediums such as polymer, paperclay, papier mache, wood and found objects. Her characters are based on images she’s drawn or seen and people she’s known and humorously portrayed.

Neva is a fifth generation Texan living in Bellaire, Texas with her husband, Kenny and her teenagers, Zach and Taylor.