About Bryant

Origin Story

I have been an artist my entire adult life, and before that a maker, a gatherer, a tinker, a what-if-we did it this way kind of girl. I was the kid in your school who always did the bulletin boards and transformed the gym or where-ever into what-ever any time it was needed. Transforming what I see around me into something else has been my job pretty much my whole life.

I was 4 years old and living in Forest City, NC when my father gave me a gift. We were there because my Dad was a textile engineer in a factory called Stone Cutter Mills. One evening he came home from work early to take me and my older brother Penn to a carnival in a local ballpark.

While we were excitedly rushing (me probably jumping) around putting on our coats and getting ready, He said “Missy, come over here, I want to show you something.” He pulled a small shiny black object out of his coat pocket. It unfolded into what I now know is a textile magnifier. It you have never seen one, these are magic pieces of plastic and glass that fit together so that you can put your eye against the hole at one end and see fabric magnified through the lens at the other end.

He held the object up to his grey tweed jacket and told me to look through the open circle in the top end. “Here Missy, look and tell me what you see,” he said. What I saw looked like another world.

Read the full essay.

For a detailed description of my work please visit the Contact page. You may also access my CV.


Photo by Martirene Alcántara (download photo)

Exhibitions and Galleries

» More Exhibitions and Galleries

Events

  • 2025 – Smack II at GLOW, Library Bridge in Downtown Cary Park, Cary, NC
  • 2024 – Jellyfish in the Sky, Spring Daze Arts and Crafts Festival, Bond Park, Cary NC
  • 2022  – Marine Debris Waterfall, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University
  • 2022  – Recycled Waterfall, Greenhill Center for NC Art, Spring
  • 2019 – Basketry Now: 10th Anniversary Exhibition, National Basketry Organization, Bowling Green, KY

» More Events

Teaching and Residencies – Adults

  • 2025 –  Wrapping Wild, Glyph Gallery Creative Space, Port Fairy, Australia
  • 2025 – Wrapping Wilder, Grampian Arts, Halls Gap, Australia
  • 2024 – Wrapping Wild: Making Animals Out of Recycled Materials, John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC
  • 2024 – Sculpture in Paper, in conjunction with Nicole Uzzell, Arrowmont School of Crafts, Gatlinburg, TN
  • 2024 – Sculptural Papermaking,  in conjunction with Nicole Uzzell, John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC
  • 2023 – Wrapping the Wild, Tryon Arts and Crafts School, Tryon, NC
  • 2023 – Wrapping Wild: Making Animals Out of Recycled Materials, John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC
  • 2021 – Spring Mix: Ravel and Unravel, Well of Mercy Retreat Center, Hamptonville, NC
  • 2020 – Angels and Animals, via Zoom, Pocosin Arts School of Fine Craft, Columbia, NC
  • 2019 – National Basketry Conference, Bowling Green, KY
  • 2019 – Wrapping Wild: Making Animals Out of Recycled Materials, Arrowmont School of Crafts, Gatlinburg, TN
  • 2017 – Grampians Texture, Tutor, Halls Gap, Australia

» More Teaching and Residencies – Adults

Publications and Awards

Teaching Kids

Teaching and Residencies – Kids

  • 2025 – Greenfields School, Wilson, NC
  • 2024 – Green Level High School, Cary, NC
  • 2022 – Cary Academy
  • 2019 – Ocean Installation, Nags Head Elementary School, Nags Head , NC
  • 2019 – Olds Elementary School – Raleigh
  • 2017 – Big Birds, Community Public Art with Green Hope High School and Town of Cary

» More Teaching and Residencies – Kids

Bryant Holsenbeck: Environmental Artist

Blackbirds, Bottle Caps, and Broken Records

Bryant Creates Bottle Cap Mandala

 

 

For a more complete representation of her work see Bryant’s CV.