Born in Fostoria, Ohio in 1925, Miriam left home at eighteen take up residence in New York City where her winning sketch for a date dress entitled her to study fashion design at Pratt Institute. She worked briefly for B.H. Wragge, but left 7th Avenue life behind to pursue work in the Decorative Arts Department at UC Berkeley. From there she went to the newly-created Renwick Gallery, a showcase for American crafts and worked on its opening exhibition, Craft Multiples. Her personal passion for ethnic textile art first found expression in a collection of San Blas molas which inspired her to create a number of large appliqued panels. Later, she became deeply interested in indigenous North American quill- and bead work, and assembled a body of research, technical illustrations, and slides on the subject which she hoped to publish. This goal was never realized, as her retirement years were dedicated to a final consuming artistic exploration of flowers, not through fiber art but on canvas. Miriam Plotnicov died in Williamsburg in the winter of 2007.