What’s on Marcia’s Mind?
The day I met Marcia Grostein, we were having Sunday brunch at la Goulue (she was upset about something–I don’t recall what) but I surely remember that in the middle of our conversation she told me she was introduced into the New York world of arts in the seventies by artist Willem De Kooning at the time her adored archetype.
The Mimosa I was sipping entered my nostrils and while waiting for my chocolate croissant to disappear from my throat I asked: “You mean De Kooning the Abstract Expressionist?” - ” Of course what do you think, and of pop artist James Rosenquist too.”- She replied while talking on the phone to her newest secret gallery deal in codes because nothing could be revealed yet.
Born in Brazil, Marcia received a Bachelor of Arts in the city of Sao Paulo. She then left in the 60s for London where she attended and graduated from the Royal Academy of Arts.
On the way out of the French restaurant, she invites me to see her apartment-studio (warning me that it’s not at all like her cousin’s–a renowned interior designer that lives in Brazil and a friend of mine). I accept. She moved to New York in 1979 while in her late twenties and refined her work at the New York School of Painting. By 1985, she became a New York painter exhibiting her work alongside of Jackson Pollok and other abstract expressionists of the 50s at the prestigious Betty Parson Gallery.
Getting out from a very old elevator in the upper East Side where she lives, we kiss a Mezuzah at the right side of the door when suddenly we enter a small but luminous studio. I am caught up by a monumental yellow canvas with painted black chairs laying on the very old wooden floor up to the right hand-side ceiling of the apartment. Behind that canvas are lots of other smaller paintings piled up in as if her living was a stock room.
Stunned by the reflection of the light, one could easily sense the visibly first-hand influence of abstract expressionists in her underlying discipline of use of blue, yellow and green around the space. I also notice I am surrounded by small and contortion-ed “Me”, “You”,” Her “large and medium signature three- dimensional skeleton chairs in impasto material.
Strongly in debt to the Italian sculptor Diego Giacometti, those chairs of the 80s and 90s visibly suggest according to an art critic of the time, quote “the artist’s new anatomies of loss and redemption”.
Some are on the floor under a beautiful Kilim rug in vibrant shades of reds and oranges other are hanging on white walls, others are painted in black on white canvases and many rest on books, ashtrays, desks or among my feet. I look at Marcia who went to the small kitchen to fix me an Assam tea and I wonder to what degree is she really aware of her own chair neuroses.
A Nikon camera next to an Alvaro Aalto 1937 Savoy blue glass vase with white flowers stares at me in silence, but I know that camera is talking to me. “Have you noticed my work on her walls? The chromogenic “Issey” and the “Central Park Series 5″? After all, even Freud would ask himself if he was alive today, what passes in Marcia’s mind when she creates?
With the Assam tea pouring from a 1937 Russel Wright Celidon teapot into a large ironstone cup, I dare to ask about her fixation with chairs, realizing I am sitting in a large vintage one upholstered with in Back vinyl, while in front of me an authentic light wood Hans J. Vegner stands courageously next to an elegant Charles Eames DKR where Marcia finally decides to sit.
She pauses, more human now, and smiles. She remembers her mother, a Tango singer, actress and sculptor who was enormously supportive of her daughter’s artistic endeavors, sometime before passing away when Marcia was twenty, and sitting quietly during her illness in front of a TV Novela (Brazilian soap opera) and “waisting” her time while she could do so many things instead, Marcia thought. Years later she found out through a psychiatric that the chairs were a symbol of the void she felt over the empty-chair caused by her mother absence.
Suddenly Marcia is not upset anymore, no more phone calls or rush, the features in her face are more relaxed while she shows me her newest creation : A jewelry line made of Bakelite, vintage beads, small Chinese jaded Buddhas and resin flowers from the 50s. They are absolutely unique and one of a kind. They look glorious and imperative to be worn in any occasion or simply left hanging on top of a black granite Eero Saarinen table top like the one of her dining room.
I look without really believing the versatile creativity of the mind behind the artist. How can she be inside different materials and and concepts and still be able to eloquently master form, quality and shape at the same time? A critic mentioned her deep affinity with the forces of her native primordial Brazil another that she internalizes Picasso’s 1930 imagery of his mistress Marie-Terese Walters in her 80′ series of canvases depicting women attached to their chairs some of them talking on the phone.
Marcia has no children, but her art paid an internationally tribute far greater than maternity itself. She now dreams of creating children’s playgrounds in large urban centers and crowded urban areas. The projects are ready, if anyone needs one in the neighborhood, please contact her.
This is really the desire she has on mind.
Joelle’s Tips:
The Artist : If you wish to have information about Marcia’s art work contact her at: Marcieg@mac.com Marcia Grostein
The Exhibition: ” Informed by Function ”
Lehman College Art Gallery
Informed by Function
Feb. 6 - May 15, 2008
Reception:
Tue. March 11, 6 to 7:30 pm
Bedford Park Boulevard West, Bronx, N.Y. 10468
Tel 718-960-8731
fax 718-960-6991
Wode Paint Boudicca & Wode Scent Boudicca
What a fabulous story. It came so alive that I felt like I was there in the studio with you!
Perhaps I need a new chair, and some of her jewelry to wear while sitting in it.
Thank you so much Alana! Anytime you wish to visit Marcia at her studio, she’ll be delighted to receive you. I am sure you’ll have a choice of where to sit!
I liked so much specially the writer form .Congratulations for you blog
Eduardo