Wilhelmina Steenbergen was born and raised in the Netherlands.  She began to get the feel of fibers at an early age as she learned domestic arts such as knitting, sewing, and crocheting.  Her highly tactile sense has served her well as she has evolved as an artist.

    In the late 70's and early 80's, she continued to express her love of fibers becoming a proficient spinner of wool and other materials.  She carded, spun, and then created original wall hangings in addition to knitting highly patterned sweaters and coats, often dying the wools with homemade dyes she brewed in her kitchen.

    In the late 80's, she took courses through Bemis School of Art in Colorado Springs, Colorado in free form pottery and created batik-looking glazed pottery within this medium, firing them in the kiln in her garage.

It was a natural progression for her to begin experimenting with paper sculpture, a paper relief pressing process which incorporates the use of objects from nature, fabric and yarn she knows so intimately, with an application of acrylics and/or oil paints, achieving a pottery raku look suitable to her sculptures.