Jennette Eala is an emerging fiber artist in Minneapolis, MN, working in embroidery on found photographs. She previously worked in metalsmithing, creating Gigi Hall Jewelry in Boulder, CO, where she raised her four children.

A longtime collector of vintage embroidered textiles, she began to dedicate herself to the craft in 2024 when she moved to Minneapolis and found a trove of antique photographs available locally. Her curiosity about the lives of the photos’ subjects inspired her to take needle and thread to the medium, reframing the subjects and prompting a textured dialogue on the complexities of gender roles, identity, and relationships, and how they manifest across time and space.

Drawing as well on her education in sociology and psychology, her Substack  Secrets and Lies  presents personal essays alongside her embroidery works, to explore the intersections of visual and verbal storytelling, representation, and communication, particularly in the context of the lives of women, past and present.