Into the light
The visionary works of Marylou Reifsnyder
By Melody Romancito, for The Taos News
Finally, after 10 years of being stowed away for safe keeping, there
is going to be another exhibition featuring the works of Marylou Reifsnyder.
First mounted in 1991, the exhibit was considered astounding. Symbols
emerging from the writings of Carl Jung, imagery rooted in folk art,
ancient tales and myth easily came to mind upon first viewing. So
impressive was the show at the Stables Art Gallery that then-director
Leah Sobol made frantic calls to make sure people knew about it before
it closed.
"Melody," she said on my answering machine, "you have
to come to the Stables and see this show. You have to come today,
because it's coming down tomorrow. I am calling because I know you
would want to see this work."
Now, the exhibition, titled "Head Into Heart: The Visionary
Art of Marylou Reifsnyder," is planned to open with a reception,
Friday (May 25) from 5-7 p.m. It was curated by Harwood Museum director
Robert M. Ellis.
The show is planned to include 51 works by Reifsnyder (1922-1990)
representing some of the drawings, watercolors, paintings, toys and
books she produced during her lifetime. Reifsnyder was largely a self-taught
artist who spent the last four years of her life working in Lama,
N.M., after coming there part time for 15 years. After a tragic early
life in San Francisco, Marylou Bishop married Bill Reifsnyder in 1954
and moved to Connecticut where her husband taught at Yale University.
Marylou Reifsnyder's "visionary work is meant for those who
will listen," wrote Ellis in the catalog, "and for whom
her language would be a reminder of another history, not just emperors
and conquerors, but an archeological (psychic) history of beliefs,
icons, and myths."
Although she is said to have never exhibited her artwork, Reifsnyder
created and hand-painted 19 manuscripts. Nine were for children (two
were published) and 10 were for adults. Ten paintings from two of
the adult books, ("The Book of Knowings" and "Book
of Days") are included in the exhibition.
It is said that Reifsnyder believed in a coming change or shift in
mankind's consciousness. Joanne Cubbs, a writer and curator, is a
leading expert on contemporary self-taught artists. She was founding
curator and head of the Folk Art Department at the High Museum of
Art in Atlanta, Ga. She wrote the second essay in the exhibit's catalog
about that aspect of her art: "Drawn to a variety of mystical
philosophies, Reifsnyder explored the religious iconography of many
times and places. She studied the images of ancient mythology, medieval
alchemy, tarot, astrology, Christian theology, and the cosmic fables
of William Blake, transforming them into the symbols of her own spiritual
quest."
Reifsnyder's personal library contained a 20-volume set of the writings
of Carl Jung, 14 books by Krisnamurti, as well as books by Manly P.
Hall and Joseph Campbell, and art books on William Blake, Pablo Picasso
and worldwide folk art.
Cedrus Monte, a Jungian Analyst and graduate of the C.G. Jung Institute
in Zurich, Switzerland, and now practicing in Taos, wrote the front
essay in the exhibition's catalog. She appears to observe that her
work addresses an unseen influence.
"Reifsnyder's approach to art defines a certain kind of artist:
one who is not concerned with making her mark in the world, but who
is enraptured by the mystery of life, by the (numinosum) - the experience
of the invisible, transcendent presence that causes an alteration
of consciousness, a shift in the psychic structure.
Reifsnyder is dauntless in her devotion and understanding of this
mystery for the unselfconscious refinement of her own soul, and for
the unpremeditated enrichment of others, with whom her work would
eventually be shared."
In her essay, Monte added, "It is not so much that Reifsnyder
was influenced by Jung, taking on his ideas and theories, but rather
that Jung's psychology reflected what was already living within her.
Jung's work, in content and in form, was an affirmation of her life's
journey as she was already living it."
Ellis said he became aware of Reifsnyder's work through the efforts
of Tiska Blankenship, the associate curator at the Jonson Gallery
of the University of New Mexico. Blankenship organized the 1991 show,
which later traveled to the Café Gallery in Albuquerque and
the Boulder Art Center in Colorado.
Ellis writes that when he saw Reifsnyder's work for the first time
he was greatly impressed. He wrote that he was at once "mesmerized
by the imagery (of the work): at once joyful and theatrical, conjuring
images of circuses or carnivals, and also perplexing because it could
not be looked at in terms of any of the relevant exploding art movements
of the last part of the 20th century."
Sobol already has the invitation for the new show hanging in her
studio. She said she is very eager to see the show, although she won't
be able to attend the opening reception because she has other obligations.
"In the three-and-a-half years I was involved with the Stables,
and of all the shows we mounted, this one really was of really high
quality. We had always dreamt of being able to exhibit this kind of
quality, but her show was definitely of a higher quality. It was also
unique. I had never seen that kind of work before." Sobol said
she felt the work made a person think.
"There is a tremendous power in her work. You got the feeling
this woman was a thinker. You knew that she was well-read - she was
a thinking artist, which, believe me, is a rare thing," Sobol
declared. We both mused that these pieces had been stored in the Reifsnyder
family home in Lama. The chances of the whole collection going up
in flames during the 1996 Hondo Fire do not require a giant stretch
of imagination.
"Her work must have its own angels guarding it. It's work that
has to be seen. It just could not go up in flames," Sobol said.
Her paintings would not go up in flames, but the refinement of Reifsnyder's
soul was tempered like a sword. Bathed in the flames of creativity,
her art poured out of her in the face of adversity and poverty. Like
hard metal can be a crude lump or shaped into a sharp tool, Reifsnyder
made the choice to turn lead into gold. This is the alchemist's secret.
This is what she must have learned.
This was the sword, but what of the cup? For Reifsnyder, the Grail
became a symbol of rebirth of the spirit, but also it called up references
to the maternal womb and signaled the rebirth of the world to new
feminine consciousness.
Reifsnyder's persistent delving into these unconscious, yet lucid
imagery is what made the works. It was her primary source for her
mystical subjects. According to Cubbs, Reifsnyder described her art-making
as a form of "deep concentration" or "meditation,"
and often her paintings drew inspiration from the stacks of "psychic
sketches" that resulted from her regular practice of spontaneous
or automatic drawing.
Jungian analysts use such techniques to unlock the hidden images
and insights that reside in the unconscious. Jung is said to have
believed that it was from deep psychological forces of the unconscious
that religious impulses and spiritual understandings come from.
Cubbs wrote, "Since Jung introduced his seminal theories over
a half a century ago, many scholars, therapists, artists, poets, and
religious humanists have revised and reapplied his ideas to create
new bodies of cultural thought and spiritual inquiry. Reifsnyder's
art is part of that project. Inspired by the dream of wholeness for
the human spirit, her work contributes its own voice to the ongoing
cultural conversation about the meaning of the feminine."
Reifsnyder opened a new path. Instead of feeling handicapped by womanhood
in a man's world, she chose the path of the feminine and the way of
the alchemist. Her Grail symbolism speaks of an optimism that the
world was slowly beginning to experience a "greater balance between
male and female sensibilities," wrote Cubbs. "Reifsnyder's
theory on the spiritual evolution of humanity through the rediscovery
of the feminine was the impetus behind her search through centuries
of religious thought and symbology In nearly all the major paintings
produced from 1960 until her death in 1990, the artist worked to capture
her vision of this new metaphysics of the heart."
In her own words, Reifsnyder described how it was for her to joyfully
take the feminine path. She knew she did not command the path, but
that she was to willingly follow.
"My poems and pictures seem to be a dramatic procession from
the psyche," Reifsnyder said, "a pageant of tragic, joyous,
and ridiculous spirits marching on all paths, straying off across
the thorny hills and going their purposeful way, attracting me along."
We are lucky to be invited to come along for the ride. The exhibit
continues through July 15. Call 758-9826. |