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June 2018
Interview Monika Rossa |
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Monika Rossa is a widely-exhibited artist both nationally and internationally. She also is the author and illustrator of several children’s books. See more of her work at https://www.rossamonika.com/
Monika Rossa is a widely-exhibited artist both nationally and internationally. She also is the author and illustrator of several children’s books. See more of her work at https://www.rossamonika.com/
MRossa_Summer By The Pool_
SAN: Monica, you tell us in your website statement that you grew up in Poland and lived in France, too. You’ve been in Tucson for many years. What led you to settle here?
Monika Rossa: My first marriage. While living in France I met my first husband. He was leaving for California, to teach math at the UC Berkeley. About eight months later we got married in Guadalajara. We had to do that since the Consulate in Paris refused me a visa. It was impossible to convince the Consul that our marriage was going to be for real. Well, it lasted twenty years. While going back to San Francisco we crossed the border with U.S. in Nogales and we passed through Tucson. I never thought that I would live here. In fact, I never thought that I will live in the USA. I never even learned any English, that is, before I came. I only spoke French and Spanish and Russian. And Polish, of course. But English was this far away language for me, not on my world map.
SAN: How do you think growing up and living in Europe informs your current artwork?
MR: I don’t know if there is any influence. Maybe my education. While young, people tend to absorb more. I was absorbing the art that was around me on daily basis. I grew up under the communism, and the communist Poland really respected the arts. All of it. The artist, the musician, the actor, the director, the writer, these were the most respected people. They were also well paid. But there were not too many of them, either. It was very hard to get into an art school. Since a very early age I wanted to be an artist, so needless to say that I was present at all the possible gallery openings in Warsaw (this is where I grew up), and one could get to the opening by invitation only. My mother was working at the radio and she was a great source when it came to artistic events. Looking at the paintings on the walls was a feast to me. I had books with the images of all the possible styles and masters. I simply loved it. So, if it is reflecting somehow in my work, it is because of my youth. I took art seriously.
SAN: Does living in the Sonoran Desert have any impact on your artwork, either directly or indirectly?
MR: How can I know? I believe that artists communicate the world that surrounds them to that very world and back. Somehow, they digest it, whatever that world is. If Sonoran Desert is around me, that it has to influence me. Mostly, the light that we have here. But I also think that artist, like all other people, come to this world with certain voice. It is that voice that they want other people to hear. In my case (and any artist living here), if the filter applied to the voice is called Sonoran Desert, then let’s be it.
Monika Rossa: My first marriage. While living in France I met my first husband. He was leaving for California, to teach math at the UC Berkeley. About eight months later we got married in Guadalajara. We had to do that since the Consulate in Paris refused me a visa. It was impossible to convince the Consul that our marriage was going to be for real. Well, it lasted twenty years. While going back to San Francisco we crossed the border with U.S. in Nogales and we passed through Tucson. I never thought that I would live here. In fact, I never thought that I will live in the USA. I never even learned any English, that is, before I came. I only spoke French and Spanish and Russian. And Polish, of course. But English was this far away language for me, not on my world map.
SAN: How do you think growing up and living in Europe informs your current artwork?
MR: I don’t know if there is any influence. Maybe my education. While young, people tend to absorb more. I was absorbing the art that was around me on daily basis. I grew up under the communism, and the communist Poland really respected the arts. All of it. The artist, the musician, the actor, the director, the writer, these were the most respected people. They were also well paid. But there were not too many of them, either. It was very hard to get into an art school. Since a very early age I wanted to be an artist, so needless to say that I was present at all the possible gallery openings in Warsaw (this is where I grew up), and one could get to the opening by invitation only. My mother was working at the radio and she was a great source when it came to artistic events. Looking at the paintings on the walls was a feast to me. I had books with the images of all the possible styles and masters. I simply loved it. So, if it is reflecting somehow in my work, it is because of my youth. I took art seriously.
SAN: Does living in the Sonoran Desert have any impact on your artwork, either directly or indirectly?
MR: How can I know? I believe that artists communicate the world that surrounds them to that very world and back. Somehow, they digest it, whatever that world is. If Sonoran Desert is around me, that it has to influence me. Mostly, the light that we have here. But I also think that artist, like all other people, come to this world with certain voice. It is that voice that they want other people to hear. In my case (and any artist living here), if the filter applied to the voice is called Sonoran Desert, then let’s be it.
MRossa_Girl With A Butterfly_
AN: You’ve written about how fascinated you are with people and how important you think it is to be able to draw and to draw the human figure in particular. How do you understand your need to convey the human experience in your work? Why do you find humans so fascinating? Not all artists think this way.
MR: I believe that humans are the most complex entities to be depicted. Not only surface (or rather 3D) wise, but psychologically speaking, too. Their life experiences, and sufferings and joys are often mirrored in their eyes and between their wrinkles, or lack of them. I found them fascinating. Not only their looks, but their secret “interiors”, the things that they want to hide but not always successfully. This is maybe that I also am a writer. Sometimes to draw a portrait isn’t enough.
SAN: Some of your human figurative work has a magical feel to it. I refer to both your large and small oil paintings which look as if they are illustrations from tale, maybe a fairy tale, to go with them. Have you or any other person written stories to accompany these paintings?
MR: I wrote three children’s books and I self-published them. It was about eight or nine years ago. These books have nothing to do with the paintings (fairy tale) you are talking about. These fairy tale paintings don’t have verbally told stories behind them. They are open and waiting for the viewers mind to engage.
MR: I believe that humans are the most complex entities to be depicted. Not only surface (or rather 3D) wise, but psychologically speaking, too. Their life experiences, and sufferings and joys are often mirrored in their eyes and between their wrinkles, or lack of them. I found them fascinating. Not only their looks, but their secret “interiors”, the things that they want to hide but not always successfully. This is maybe that I also am a writer. Sometimes to draw a portrait isn’t enough.
SAN: Some of your human figurative work has a magical feel to it. I refer to both your large and small oil paintings which look as if they are illustrations from tale, maybe a fairy tale, to go with them. Have you or any other person written stories to accompany these paintings?
MR: I wrote three children’s books and I self-published them. It was about eight or nine years ago. These books have nothing to do with the paintings (fairy tale) you are talking about. These fairy tale paintings don’t have verbally told stories behind them. They are open and waiting for the viewers mind to engage.
MRossa_Trip 10-1_
SAN: Other figurative work is expressionistic and some are almost surrealistic, reminding me of the Mexican surrealists Remedios Varo and Leonora Carrington. This brings me to ask, how do you decide to portray people? How do you choose among the different styles, for example, the style of “Trip 10” (pen and ink) or “Girls and Butterflies” (oil) or the expressionism of “Summer by the Pool?” (oil?)
MR: They are all in me, and I can’t help it. Artist express themselves however they can, without choosing trends or pleasures. I can portray the same person in those three “style”, and every style will have some truth to it.
MR: They are all in me, and I can’t help it. Artist express themselves however they can, without choosing trends or pleasures. I can portray the same person in those three “style”, and every style will have some truth to it.
MRossa_Oles_
SAN: Your pastels are more traditional portraits. How did you choose mode of portraying portraits?
MR: I do it for practice. It is difficult to draw a portrait. I don’t only mean the likeness and such, but something deeper, the very character of the model. We all carry in us more than what is just visible. I am trying to find it.
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SAN: Despite your expressed interest in humans, you have quite a few painting of animals –a cat, fox, buffalo, deer, and horse. What appeals to you animals as a subject of your paintings?
MR: Who doesn’t love animals? They do inspire me. Their colors and shapes and the way they express themselves. They don’t hide who they are. They are fully exposed (that is, once we see them) to the world, to the past and present. They make me think about us, humans, but from a different perspective. Plus, of course, I love to exaggerate their shapes. They just ask for it. |
MRossa_On the Night Wall_
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MRossa_Destination_
SAN: You’ve written about painting abstractions as a way “to get some fresh air into my mind.” Please explain this. How is an abstraction a bringer of fresh air?
MR: I never asked myself why is it that it’s happening that way. I just do it. Now, when I think of it, I would say that painting an abstract painting is a very different process (at least for me), that the one that has figures. With the abstract painting, I don’t make any plans. I am launching myself into the unknown and I keep searching for a completion and the sense of a closed circle. Sometimes it happens fast. Sometimes it takes a while. I don’t trust the ones that took too long or when I thought that I had to use my intellect in order to “save” the painting. Even when somebody says that it is a good painting, I know what tricks it took to make it there, and I am not happy about it. Abstract paintings are raw honesty, at least the ones I paint. Maybe fresh air is that honesty that I am exposing myself to while I paint them.
SAN: An ongoing discussion we’ve had here on Sonoran Arts Network is about how artists promote and sell their art. You show your work in galleries both in the real world and online. Do you find that the online galleries are as effective in selling your art and real-world galleries?
MR: Not at all. Online doesn’t work for me. I show it just because I want people to see my work. Even my website is only for “representational” purposes. Only once I sold a painting that I showed on my Facebook. A friend bought it.
MR: I never asked myself why is it that it’s happening that way. I just do it. Now, when I think of it, I would say that painting an abstract painting is a very different process (at least for me), that the one that has figures. With the abstract painting, I don’t make any plans. I am launching myself into the unknown and I keep searching for a completion and the sense of a closed circle. Sometimes it happens fast. Sometimes it takes a while. I don’t trust the ones that took too long or when I thought that I had to use my intellect in order to “save” the painting. Even when somebody says that it is a good painting, I know what tricks it took to make it there, and I am not happy about it. Abstract paintings are raw honesty, at least the ones I paint. Maybe fresh air is that honesty that I am exposing myself to while I paint them.
SAN: An ongoing discussion we’ve had here on Sonoran Arts Network is about how artists promote and sell their art. You show your work in galleries both in the real world and online. Do you find that the online galleries are as effective in selling your art and real-world galleries?
MR: Not at all. Online doesn’t work for me. I show it just because I want people to see my work. Even my website is only for “representational” purposes. Only once I sold a painting that I showed on my Facebook. A friend bought it.