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Through November 8th now at ACE wing of Sarratt

Here is the text of an interview for the show

“Early Fall” by Margie Manyik Sarratt Gallery at Vanderbilt University, September 2- October 11

In Margie Manyik’s world, a single autumn leaf can be a springboard to something else entirely. She grew up walking through the woods of her native West Virginia thinking and daydreaming in an artist’s landscape laden with colorful images. Walks in nature continue to provide much of her artistic inspiration because they allow her to discover patterns in the natural elements where light reflections mingle impulsively with other things. Inspired by nature’s bounty and its simplicity, she may find several leaves backlit by the sun or one fallen leaf blending into the earth equally impressive.

These random occurrences provide the concrete inspiration for her recent work, Early Fall, currently on exhibit at The Sarratt Gallery in The Sarratt Student Center at Vanderbilt University.

Manyik would like the viewer to experience “nature as a whole” in her work. She believes “when you’re in the woods, it’s your world,” and hopes her paintings will evoke the feeling of wind on the viewer’s cheeks, the temperature in the air, the crispness of the leaves and the smell of them too regardless that they hang indoors. A sense of ‘place’ influences these representations and she believes travel lends great opportunities to open the eyes to alternative ways of looking artistically at something, even Nature. Many of the paintings included in Early Fall were inspired by local walks at Radnor Lake and Percy Warner Park. Destinations ranging from Colorado to Columbia provide influence as well. For instance, an idea that germinated in South America was impacted by her return to native soil. The work as well as the process is spontaneous and free flowing like nature itself. Her desire to capture the feel of a particular moment is successful as the images flow across the canvases among areas of light and dark to create art that feels calm and peaceful. One might never guess that paintings by Piet Mondrian influenced her work mainly by his interesting use of tension, juxtaposing strong areas of light and dark with color. A sense of this same “tension” can be seen in Manyik’s own body of work while shape, form and color usage remain solely her own.

“It feels good.” Manyik says when asked why she paints this way. “To be able to capture color then step back and look at the work you’ve done, it just feels good.” Visit Margie Manyik’s Early Fall exhibit at the Sarratt Gallery and escape into nature without ever leaving the building. Like a slow walk in the woods on an early fall day, viewing this exhibition feels good too.

Interviewed and written by Dawn Hopkins