TALKING PICTURES
Born in Biloxi, Mississippi, Mary Josephson, the oldest of four sisters, was part of a military family, which moved frequently throughout California and the Southwest when she was a child. Early on, she became accustomed to the concept of constant change as a way of life, and to accepting the unusual as the usual, and thus, she has always benefited greatly from her acute observations of the differing people, places and things around her. She has said that the trees and animals, birds, fruits and flowers found in the agricultural communities of her childhood have provided her with a sense of well-being and harmony. For nearly a quarter century, Josephson has been a painter of people of diverse ethnic backgrounds, genders and ages, an optimist creating harmonious worlds and rich chromatic conversations focused on the communality in, and the positive aspects of, relationships between humans, or in the artist’s words, “the heroics of everyday life.
A large scale painting from 1999 made during a residency in Roswell, NM, New Friends/ Two Eves, celebrates the connections between a Caucasian and a Latina woman, and honors the bonds of knowledge and femininity that unite them. The barefooted women are surrounded by flora and fauna, with the forbidden fruit and the serpent of the Garden of Eden, and by the trappings of a tea party, replete with cakes and fanciful hats. For Josephson, this work is about mutual acceptance overcoming assumptions, prejudice and fear, and about the power and nobility found in the faces and bodies of mature women. In the 2003 painting A little bird told me, in a bucolic setting, a radiant Gauguinesque beauty, perhaps of royal Polynesian lineage, averts her eyes as she appears to listen to the avian messenger on her shoulder, just as the Latina Eve did in Two Friends/ Two Eves. Here we have another conversation, but of a different kind.
Mary Josephson speaks of layers and juxtapositions in her work – elements of color, of form, and of story - that continually reinforce and enhance one another, ultimately inviting and including the viewer in a dialogue with the paintings. Often she creates “mythological paintings,” less about portraiture and more about feelings and emotional journeys. Opening, from 2003, depicts three striking women of color surrounded by darkness, one of whom is releasing a bird into the white light; only one of the three women makes eye contact with the viewer. In Heart of the Seekers, from 2004, encased in a densely floral paradise with companion birds, a taciturn trio of Latina, African, and Caucasian women seems to be lost in thought, in three different worlds, with at least three different dreams. And in Dream Meadow, from 2003, enormous butterflies and dragonflies inhabit a place where cats without bodies and horses with six legs can fly too (if they are kites manipulated by boys and girls of diverse backgrounds.) Here Josephson paints the world she hopes will be rather than what might be the reality now.
Search for Knowledge, a 5’ x 20’ mural commissioned in 2004 for the Catlin Gabel Upper School Library in Portland, is a complex allegorical work exploring the exciting journey undertaken by students as they pursue knowledge. For Josephson, the cycle of life is represented by the seasons, with four panels, beginning in winter with a boy and girl embarking on the path of learning and discovery, continuing through spring, where students are planting a garden and engaging in creative pursuits, moving into summer where sunflowers become the pathway and students communicate with one another by voice and computers, and finally ending in autumn, where globes symbolize the wealth of wisdom available throughout the world, and students harvest the fruits of knowledge, and share information with a younger student in a conversation about what may lie ahead. In her mural, the artist has referenced specific buildings from the school, and painted the blackbirds that inhabit the campus, and she has also included symbols and elements of the arts and sciences as well as diverse cultures, producing a work of heroic scale in glorious color.
A work from 2002, Looking Homeward (with eyes toward the world) offers the viewer a red lipped blonde sporting a brilliantly colored garment with a Rousseau-like environment populated by denizens of Josephson’s animal kingdom – birds, cats, monkeys, snakes, leopards, tigers, ‘gators, and swimming downstream, even whales and fish! All this and blue skies and puffy white clouds too. Quite a different story from the woman in Fear Nothing, from 2004. Tightly framed in blue and green with a heavily impastoed multicolored background, her dark tresses stream out from her face as she moves forward, focused inward, talking to herself. In contrast, the glamorous gal in Almost Positive from 2004 gazes unflinchingly at the viewer, full of confidence and attitude, and ready for anything.
Josephson has made paintings for this exhibition where her subjects seem to be transported into another world while performing on musical instruments. She considers instruments to be exotic objects of beauty, form and function. The double bass player in Deep Dark Blue from 2004 closes her eyes and appears to be in an indigo dream state, while the lovely raven-haired horn player in I hear the beat and I’m on it (2004) ponders her next move, ready to pounce on the notes like a hunter poised for prey. Each woman is engaged on multiple levels – with the instrument, the music, the viewer, and the Muse.
For the last fifteen years, Mary Josephson has painted a “four sisters” painting for every exhibition she has had, showing an event, sometimes real, sometimes imagined, in the lives of the artist and her three sisters. While in Washington, DC. this year for an award ceremony where her sister Sally received a Bronze Star for service in Iraq, Mary visited the Lincoln Memorial for the first time. Thinking about how divided our country is at this time, and how far we are from equality for all people, Josephson’s painting Questions for Mr. Lincoln uses her signature blackbirds to pose important questions for the viewer (and for the Nation) which address the nature of freedom and numerous significant issues fundamental to the American way of life – such as truth?, free speech?, choice?, equality?, censor?, war?, ecology?, health care?, and economy?. In addition, each year Josephson typically paints a portrait of her daughter, Aurora, which vividly illustrates the well-known French adage: “Plus ça change, plus C’est la même chose…” (“The more things change, the more they stay the same…”) I feel it; I don’t know it (2004) shows Aurora with fuchsia locks, surrounded by luscious flowers and foliage in vibrant hues signaling the intensity of the moment.
Although Josephson’s paintings pay homage to Henri Rousseau, Ferdinand Leger and the great Mexican muralists, she has clearly developed her own visual language. It is a language in which a riot of color is totally saturated with meaning, where luminosity enables fantastic dreams, and where pigment speaks in dynamic dialogues. These are Mary Josephson’s talking pictures, and they are full of life.
Margery Aronson Seattle, Washington Copyright 2004
