With all the depth and breadth in the 21st annual “Materials: Hard & Soft,” the overall feeling is that the Greater Denton Arts Council’s flagship exhibit is somehow more hard than soft.

It’s not that the show doesn’t have plenty of fiber — the quilts and fiber works in the show are some of the best the annual exhibit has every put under track lighting. It’s that there are corners, sharp turns and stiff lines in much of what meets the eye.

Denton artist Georgia Gough selected this year’s show, and she said in her juror’s statement that the show has come a long way.

“When ‘Hard & Soft’ began 22 years ago the job of the juror was simple,” she said. “Clay entries consisted of pottery, the fibers were weavings, and the metals were jewelry. The show was a selection of the best of these.”

Gough, who helped found the exhibit, kept it simple when she selected this year’s show.

“Before I looked at a single image this year I selected two criteria by which to judge the pieces,” Gough said in her juror’s statement. “These were craftsmanship and innovation. Some objects may be stronger in one than in the other. This arbitrary decision automatically eliminated some pieces, but I believe these limitations define the exhibition.”

So where does the hardness come in?

Many of the works in fiber sport distinct lines and angles, like Mary Beth Bellah’s fiber piece Second Wave.

This tribute to water is a wonder. Bellah quilted small blocks of fabric — all falling somewhere on the blue-to-green spectrum — with a wavy thread pattern.

Using thread, Bellah stitched the quilt block to other blocks, shaping them into the form of a breaking wave. She doesn’t skimp on the detail. The color gets lighter as the wave flops over itself, and sea foam is suggested with light colored netting, droplets hinted at by sparkling beads.

The whole piece is set on a blue, burlap-wrapped frame. The left side of the piece is embellished with beads, shells and stories about oceanic disasters, like storms and the Titanic, printed on transparency paper and stitched onto the work.

Gerrit van Ness’ hardness comes off both soft and shell-like. His piece, “Peek A Boo, I Watchin’ You” is Pixar-perfect, a saucy vessel sprouting a long neck and very red lips. It creeps around an imaginary corner on three-toed feet. The vessel is azure and the feet are glazed with a metallic paint.

Van Ness convinces you the piece is blown glass or maybe metal. But no, he works in wood. His work feels current, as if it’s generated by an unattended animation program that makes everything bulbous and happy — at least in spurts.

Not all of the pieces are hard, though.

Some of the more classical work blend hardness with softness Max Krimmel’s “Vessel #686” is turned Colorado alabaster. It’s a flat, open bowl with a textured, painted body and a heart-shaped rim. The inside and the rim are lined with smooth, pearly alabaster. The outside is raw pink. Altogether, the piece suggests flesh, both tender and supple.

A hard material is rendered soft under a master’s hands, and Krimmel has work in the permanent collection of the Smith­son­ian Institution’s Renwick Gallery.

Sarah Holden’s “Empire Line Posture Device” looks soft, but incorporates ribbon and metal. The piece is meant to be worn — theoretically — around the rib cage, just beneath the bust, like a dress with an empire waist.

The “belt” is covered with pink and gray ribbon, wrapped bandage-like around the form. A long rod is attached to the back of the belt, with a weighted ball made out of metal eyelets. A photo next to the piece illustrates how it is to be worn. With this contraption of torture on, the model’s torso would be straight, or else flat on the floor.

The annual craft exhibit is regarded highly, and the Texas Commission on the Arts selected the exhibit last year as one of the top 40 arts events in the state. This year’s crop of artists and art is no less refined — or funny — and its impact ever sharper thanks the shrewd eye of the juror.

The exhibit runs through March 20.

LUCINDA BREEDING can be reached at 940-566-6877. Her e-mail address is cbreeding@dentonrc.com .

What: National craft competition and exhibit sponsored by the Greater Denton Arts Council

When: Exhibit continues through March 20. Gallery hours are 1 to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday.

Where: Meadows Gallery at the Center for the Visual Arts, 400 E. Hickory St.

Details: Admission is free. For more information, call 940-382-2787 or visit www.dentonarts.com .