Her work incorporates the landscapes and colors of New Mexico with bold contemporary architectural frames that create depth and optical illusions. Within the window, a unifying theme in her artwork, she blends the representational with the abstract and entices the viewer with a bold approach to color.  

She has won numerous art competitions and commissions during her career. Commissions include a triptych for the City/County Building in Albuquerque and a large tapestry for the Bernalillo County Courthouse. Accolades include the display of three of her tapestries at the Albuquerque Museum and an appearance on a HGTV special. (Donna's work is shown and collected throughout the United States and abroad.)

Recently the Art in Embassies Program bought one of ther tapestries for the American Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. Donna was awarded Acclaimed Artist status by the New Mexico Arts, the public art division of the state, and a large tapestry was installed in the Children, Youth and Family Department Building in Albuquerque. One of her tapestries will be on display in Prescott, Arizona in the Fiber Celebrated 2003 exhibit in conjunction with the Intermountain Weavers Conference, Summer 2003. Donna Loraine was also on the the 62 artists chosen from over 300 to exhibit in the Originals 2003, Traces of the Journey Show at the Albuquerqe Mueseum, Summer 2003, put on by the New Mexico Women in the Arts.

Douglas Kent Hall, in The Thread of New Mexico, says "Contractor combines unlikely dynamic forms with a scintillating palette to achieve an evocative and compelling style of weaving. She utilized traditonal....concepts as well as certain graphic constructs that fueled the work of many twentieth-century painters and brings to contemporary tapestry a freshness that is sometimes startling."