Artists abound
Second in a series on resident artists
As part of an ongoing series
looking into the work and lives of resident artists, the Mountain Express turns this week
to a sculptor and two painters/print makers.
By ADAM TANOUS
Express Staff Writer
Abby Grosvenor:
monoprints and painting
Art has infused Abby Grosvenor’s life from the beginning. As a
child, representational drawing and painting always came easy to her. But now, years
later, she speaks so excitedly about her recent work with monoprinting that one would
think it was a new hobby.
In an interview last week, Grosvenor lit up when the conversation turned
to printmaking. She had done printmaking in graduate school but, up until recently when a
business called "No Toad Press" came about, she had not had access to a press.
Grosvenor described the appeal of the medium. "What is interesting to
me about printmaking is coming to grips with an image that is fleeting." She added,
"a lot more is left up to happenstance with this type of work."
To understand what she means, one has to have a sense of the process
involved. Traditional printmaking, or lithography, is an old process that involves working
on metal or stone plates with inks. With the monoprint work she is doing, Grosvenor uses a
Plexiglas plate and oil based paints and inks. The artwork is then stabilized with acids
and other chemicals. A special paper is put into the press, and it is printed. Grosvenor
can, as she put it, "fiddle" with the print afterwards. Sometimes a second
print, referred to as a "ghost image," can be made, but generally only one image
is made.
One quirk of this system is that all of the images are reversed upon
printing. So in doing the artwork, one has to paint the mirror image of the desired final
product. It is a twist that might drive many artists crazy. Grosvenor simply said ,
"I’ve just learned to write backwards."
It is a very process-intensive medium, but it is also what is appealing to
Grosvenor. She said "there is a lot of process with monoprinting, but it also has a
clarity and finish right away…I like the idea of a traditional process and structure
with a non-traditional look."
Grosvenor’s current work is a series of non-representational, black
and white prints. She said she likes to choose the size and general nature of the pieces
before she starts. She feels "supported" by this structure. At the same time,
she tries not to have a pre-conceived idea of the work, because then "the work is
done in my head instead of on the surface."
Grosvenor has not always done non-representational work. In fact, for most
of her life she painted representational works. She distinctly remembers a teacher in the
‘60s encouraging her to move into the non-representational realm. She remembers his
describing such work as "real toads in an imaginary garden," a phrase from the
poet Marianne Moore.
It is a line that struck a chord. For her part, Grosvenor described this
type of work as a "dialogue between her and the surface…Everything you see and
do informs the work."
By contrast, Grosvenor said the dialogue in representational work goes
three ways -- from the artist looking at the subject, to the paper, and then back to the
artist."
Grosvenor plans to keep working with non-representational monoprints as
long as she can. She said she loves dealing with surfaces and trying to "create space
on a two-dimensional surface." She added, "The other interesting aspect of it is
the work can change as you are going."
While she loves to show and sell her work, Grosvenor said she is less
interested in the work after it is done. For her, "It’s the process that’s
exciting."
And this enthusiasm is all too evident. One gets the feeling that she can
hardly wait to get back to her paints and press.
Gay Bawa Odmark:
monoprints and painting
When asked what it was about printmaking that appealed to her, Gay Bawa
Odmark responded much like Grosvenor: "The element of surprise is what I like."
But that is where the two women’s experiences diverge. For
Odmark’s work is deeply intertwined with her upbringing in India. She sees her work
as "using different techniques to express her culture. Most of my images are images
of India, of the East." Born in 1940 in Lahore, India, which is now in Pakistan,
Odmark was six years old when the British left India.
It was, as she said, "a very treacherous time." As fighting
raged between Hindus and Muslims, 12 million people were killed and millions more
re-located. There was brutality everywhere. Odmark has distinct memories of seeing limbs
being severed from bodies. It was a time that had a very great impression upon her. Later,
when she had started to paint, the work that came out was "very black, dark
painting."
In 1988, Odmark was working on a master’s degree in photography at
the San Francisco Art Institute. When it became apparent that the development chemicals
were making her physically ill, Odmark decided to return to her homeland, India. She
stayed for four months. It was at this time she realized she wanted and/or needed to
paint. This decision led her to move to Sun Valley in 1989.
Soon thereafter, Odmark began to shuttle between Sun Valley and London,
where she studied painting at Slade Academy. All of the pieces she did there were big,
five foot paintings.
Though Odmark has taken many art classes over the years, from textiles to
bookbinding, she considers herself self-taught. She has worked with jewelry and
photography in addition to her current work in printing. But it wasn’t until she
turned 50 did she come out with a large body of work.
Odmark’s current work, which she showed this past weekend at Davis
Gallery, revolves around a special place in her life, the Ganges river near Varanasi.
It is for Odmark, and millions of others a holy city. People come from all
over the world to purify themselves in waters of the river, despite the fact that it is
terribly polluted. Odmark said to be there at 5 a.m. and to see all of the people, young
and old, sick and healthy, purifying themselves is quite remarkable. Odmark, who journeys
to India about once every ten years, plans to go back this December.
She considers these images of the East that come to her to be both a curse
and a blessing. She feels blessed because the images "seem to be an endless
palette" for her."
The curse, she said, is that if one "doesn’t do the art work,
then the images stay in one’s head."
The work she recently exhibited is what she described as
"booksize." They are approximately six-by-nine inches in size, all very
colorful. Odmark says they were inspired by a book cover project she has been commissioned
to do. Since then, she said, she has been intrigued by the idea of a page or front cover.
Odmark’s plans for the future include continuing to work with
monoprints and with yet another process called "transfers." The latter is a
process that involves using photography, a chemical transfer process, and painting. It
incorporates much of Odmark’s artistic experience.
She also plans on continuing to teach art to young people, something she
has done for the past eight years through the Silver Creek Alternative School. Odmark
feels very strongly that it is incumbent upon artists to "work with the
community."
She added, "artists tend to be somewhat insular." Odmark said
that she feels fortunate to have been involved with the children. "I think I’m
most gratified when teaching children."
Bruce Smith:
sculpture
A theme that seems to run through the lives of talented artists is
that of art as an affliction, though not in the pejorative sense.
Rather, art is an element that keeps coming back into their lives despite
all odds.
Such is the experience of bronze sculptor Bruce Smith.
Smith creates representational bronze pieces with a wide range of subject
matter. Several of his wildlife figures are currently exhibited at Broschofsky Galleries.
Smith also creates sporting figures such as fishermen and boxers.
Smith’s art often begins with a drawing. To create a sculpture of a
moose, for example, Smith spent a great deal of time in snow shoes tracking around a
Wyoming ranch.
When he finally found his subject, Smith made some field sketches and
notes. Back home, he took his drawing and created a simple wire armature.
From there he was able to build up around the armature with a heated wax.
Once Smith has the form he wanted, he took the piece to a foundry in Joseph, Ore. The
foundry made a mold out of rubber and plaster, then poured it with bronze.
While Smith had drawn and painted throughout his childhood, he was on a
fairly traditional, if highly academic, path through life. He graduated from Andover and
Yale. After studying English at Yale, he enrolled at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques
in Paris.
During his second year there, Smith, who had played hockey at Yale,
started playing professional hockey in the European league. It was lucrative and fun
enough to break his academic momentum. Smith gave up his studies for time on the ice, much
to the dismay of his parents.
By the time Smith headed back home in 1964, he had written two novels and
had decided to pursue his love of art at the Art Student Lounge in New York City. Smith
said that he was, "flat broke at the time," but, at least, he was painting.
Smith was then offered an opportunity to stay in the Taos hunting lodge of
the famed Mabel Dodge, a sort of Gertrude Stein figure in Taos who attracted several
artists to the area, including D.H. Lawrence. Supporting himself with a teaching job,
Smith used the time here to do more writing , painting, and sculpting.
By the late 1960s, Smith ended up in another tiny artist colony, this one
in southern Spain. As it turned out, actorRobert Redford and writer Thomas McGuane were
two other struggling creative people in the same town.
It was in the mid-1970s that Smith’s art underwent a dramatic change.
He had always been heavily influenced by artists like David Smith and Anthony Caro and,
therefore, was doing primarily non-representational pieces. Smith then began doing more
representational wildlife and sporting figures at this time.
While raising children during the 1980s, Smith continued to teach art. But
then in 1987, the writing bug got to him again, and he moved to California to try his hand
at screenwriting.
Up until last year, Smith worked full time writing films. Along the way,
he teamed up with novelist Rick Sloan. The two have worked on several successful projects
together, the most recent for the Kennedy-Marshall Group.
And now that he has an established writing career, Smith can again feel
the tug of his art. He would like to work more in sculpture and less in screenwriting. It
is a dilemma other talented people have faced: choosing between disciplines.
Smith sees it from a very humble perspective. As he put it, "I’m
still working on my life."
