Marylin Pappas

Go to text

Marylin Pappas

 

L'Artiste: Artist. A word that covers so many genres. Would you describe yourself and your art in 10 words for us?

MP: Making, looking,learning, teaching art - my life’s enriching, creative continuum
 

 

L'Artiste: Did you come from an artistic background?

MP: My parents, first generation immigrants from England and Eastern Europe had great respect for the arts.

 

L'Artiste: You studied Fine Art and have stated that you loved drawing. When and why did you change to textile?

MP: During the early 1960s I was at home more often with small children and I found that working with fabric collage and assemblage was both challenging and possible. For me, the stitched elements were another form of drawing.

         

L'Artiste: You worked for 42 years as a teacher. How much time were you able to dedicate to your own art?

MP: I always managed to work on my own art for several hours a week and I accomplished this by continually adjusting the media to the timeconstraints of teaching and family. Mixed media collages were spontaneous; stitched pieces developed slowly.

 

L'Artiste: And did teaching expand your own artistic horizons? And how?

MP: Teaching continually expanded my understanding of the arts. There were new courses to develop.My students and their explorations motivated and inspired me. Traveling broadened my love of art history and I have always been fascinated with contemporary art as well.Mine has been a life of learning new ideas.

 

L'Artiste: Your art form of choice is not conducive to vast output. Do you try to produce a set amount of work per year or is it the creativity that inspires you and if people like the result that is a bonus?

MP: Since I have never had to support myself with proceeds from my artworks, I have enjoyed the luxury of working as slowly as needed

at any given time, unless I am preparing for an exhibit, but usually I give myself ample time to develop and complete works.

 

L'Artiste:  I read that you started by creating woodcuts. Was the move to fabric an ending of a form or a progression? And if so how did this manifest for you? 

MP: The woodcuts were developed  while I was doing graduate work at Penn State University and could work in the printmaking studio there. The fabric pieces grew out of this work when I was at home more with my small children. For me the fabric became a major progression and area of interest that still challenges and delights me today.

 

L'Artiste: Would you explain your process for a piece please? From concept to production.

MP: My recent stitched pieces begin with a search for a classical sculpture that interests me, often because I have actually seen it and somehow it strikes a chord. From photographs of the sculpture and / or from my own sketches made on site in museums, I make full scale sketches that I often cut out and then I trace the outline onto the linen. I then do a little sketching with pencil on the linen but mostly I develop the drawing slowly with a needle and thread.

  The final piece, therefore, is a very free interpretation of the original sculpture. My recent work deals mainly with the colors and patterns that originally were painted on the sculptures that we see as white marble today. I try to imagine how these bright and often garish colors eroded over time and how the life of the colors and the beauty of the figures kept changing.

           

L'Artiste: You have had a long and illustrious career. Do you believe that it is easier now than it was to be recognised as a female artist?

MP: Generally, yes, although I found that, as a young artist working with fabrics, in a non-utilitarian way that was at that time rather unusual, it was easier to show the work and be recognized for it - less competition than now.

 

L'Artiste: Who (artists) do you take inspiration from?

MP:Robert Rauschenberg’s early combine paintings were an early inspiration -also the colors in the work of Matisse, the abstractions of Picasso, and  of course the classical sculptors!

     
L'Artiste: The life of beauty and the life of colour, History Lessons, Fragments, Muses and collages all have strong connotations to classical works and also the feminine form. Is this a conscious synergy or something that became apparent after the event?

MP:These works grew from my travels in Greece, France, and Italy, where I became increasingly interested in classical architecture and sculpture and especially in their images of women. The ancient goddesses, although broken and worn, express a strength, beauty and vulnerability that still resonates with women today.

 

L'Artiste:  Would you classify yourself as a feminist?

MP: As a woman who had multiple roles over time,as teacher, artist, mother, wife and single parent , when most women were stay at home moms, I have always been interested in equality for women and in the ideals expressed by the feminist movement.

 

L'Artiste:  If you could only take one piece of work that you created with you on a trip which would it be and why?

MP: It would be the one I was currently working on so that I could continue working on it while on the trip.

        

L'Artiste: Is there one work in any genre that you have seen and wished that you had created it? And why?

MP: The Nike of Samothrace in the Louvre, for the power!

 

L'Artiste:  If I may say so, your art and your methodology hark to a slower paced life where people maybe worked a little harder for their art (our words not yours). You have seen many changes in how art is viewed and appreciated. Do you feel that ‘art’ is in a better place than when you started? Or has the modern world rushed through the public’s appreciation of art?

MP: Our multi media world puts art at the fingertips of everyone and that’s good but I love having the luxury now of developing a work slowly over time and in a way that cannot be accomplished more quickly. I wish more people could take the time to do this…..and to appreciate art at a slower pace.

 

L'Artiste: What are you working on now?

MP: I am working on two pieces now. One is an interpretation of an early relief of three women who seem to be dancing, but I am imagining them in the colors they may have been painted. I am also revisiting an earlier work, “Iris”, only this time in eroding colors and patterns.

 

L'Artiste:  What advice would you give to an artist starting out now?

MP: Try to learn as much as you can about past and present art, keep exploring your own artistic vision and continue to work, even if you have little time and no decent place to work. Don’t stop. The smallest, quickest sketches could lead to important concepts that feed your artistic vision for years.