Susan (the elder) and Kate (the younger) Barnes are a mother-daughter partnership that makes up Cargo Studios. Kate Barnes's studio is in Oakland, Maine where she lives (paints, gardens, sings) with her husband and daughter. Susan's studio is in Biddeford, Maine where she paints and writes. Both Susan and Kate exhibit art regularly. The idea for Travelers came to Susan when she was pregnant. She wanted to make a figure her children could hang on the wall to inspire their imaginations about other lands and other people. She made the first one in 1970 using similar material (recycled cloth, plaster, paint, clay, feathers, stones, shells, beads). Kate has been making figures all her life... drawings, paintings, and sculptures. Over the years, with Kate's inventive input, the Travelers have changed and blossomed. Susan and Kate have learned that the desire to imagine lands of the spirit serves adults even more than children. Each Traveler is unique. An observer of any of Susan's or Kate's creations will gravitate towards an expressions in a face, a range of color in clothing, or the articles they carry... and find connection to the geographic imagination within themselves.