Today we’d like to introduce you to Marcia R. Wise.
Marcia, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My interest in art began during weekly visits to my local library when I was about 7 years old where one day, as I was looking through the art section, I came across a book about French Impressionist painters. The full plates of color-filled images gave me an immediate feeling of having found… well, “Home.” This was some wonderful feeling, as if a recognition from long ago, a deja vu feeling, came over me.
I grew up with my Italian grandparents and my childhood home was filled with creative energy. My grandmother was a dress designer and my grandfather was a shoe maker. My mother and her siblings were musical, my uncle was a big band leader and could play just about any instrument. In this home, I was always encouraged to be creative. I loved watching all the leather machinery in my grandfather’s shop and my grandmother taught me how to sew, knit, crochet and cook. When I began to paint with my mother’s nail polish, I was given watercolors, colored pencils, chock pastels and end rolls of paper from the local newspaper.
At 7, I began filling sketchbooks with odd characters who I would bring to life in my mind. Being an only child, this was a way for me to have “playmates” of a sort.
My first love was music and my mother began taking me to musical theater productions. And although I loved it, I was a painfully shy child, hardly unable to speak in front of anyone, let alone be on a stage. Having my loved ones see this helped them guide me. I was given the opportunities to take piano, guitar and voice lessons which I am always grateful for, just as grateful for the direction in which I was lead – into visual art.
Growing up on Cape Cod, my mother searched for a place where I could take art lessons and to my mother I give all the credit for my knowledge of color! She found Henry Hensche at The Cape Cod School of Art in Provincetown, Mass and somehow convinced him that he should allow me to take classes at his school. So, by the time I went into High School, I knew what I wanted to do and I also knew where I wanted to study.
The Impressionist palette lead me to L’Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. And eventually, after the shyness abated, I found myself as a young woman in Paris, France. This is where I did my undergraduate work in Fine Arts – Studio Art/Painting being my major.
Returning to the states as I was nearing the end of my studies, my father was a constant reminder that I would need to further my education so that I could support myself. Oh, yes, right… but I wanted to be an exhibiting artist! Now the question of how to make this happen arose. The answer came in the most unusual of circumstances. But isn’t life like that?
I had decided to do some traveling after college and since George Harrision was an idol of mine, I decided to travel through Europe to Asia, ending up in India – sort of following George’s footsteps, if you will. I’d been “a seeker,” and George Harrison did for me what I am sure he did for many – for me he helped me to understand from where comes this desire to create. What is the purpose for making art? And, for me, by that Beatles’ example, the answer was soul expression. However, I only made it as far as Israel – a country I had not really contemplated visiting. It happened that I met people going there and since I was alone, I tagged along. After all, it was in the direction in which I was headed and now I wasn’t alone anymore.
Little did I know then that I would spend 2 years in that country, learn Hebrew, and work with the youth, teaching art. From that experience, I realized that I was a natural teacher and that I was highly inspired by people younger than me as we worked together. I never made it to India until 2013, but I returned home from Israel knowing how I was going to support myself, happy to let my dad know my plans, and then proceeded to return to school for art education.
I was an art teacher for over 40 years during which time I continued to paint, experiment, learn and develop my own style, a style that continues today to grow and open and expand.
Today, I am finally ready to retire! It’s interesting to me because after retiring from teaching in an educational environment, I began to develop my own workshops and then facilitated them for many years while putting more time into my own work. I have a few more workshops scheduled for next year, but those will be my last. What I will continue to do is take other painters to Italy and the Southwestern US to paint. Who knows, maybe other locations will appear. My love of travel is now doubled with my love of painting and in being with others who want the same experience.
Along with this, I also have my business located in the South End of Boston’s Arts and Design District of SoWa at 450 Harrison Avenue. I’m presently in studio #403 and this is new! My husband, Ed, and I moved closer to Boston from Western Massachusetts and after a bit of a wait, I was offered a studio in SoWa. I also have a work studio in my home, so I use both and my studio at 450 Harrison Ave is more a show space for me now. It’s exciting and vibrant, so full of wonderful creatives, and I’m making new friendships there, too.
A bonus is that right across the street at 460C Harrison Avenue is where Fountain Street Gallery is located and I am a core member there. My first exhibit at Fountain Street Gallery will be October 31 to November 25, 2018 and is titled “Where Earth Meets Sky.” The Opening Reception falls on a First Friday when all the studios and galleries in the area are open for the public. That is Friday, Nov. 2nd from 6-8PM and all are invited. Oh… I forgot to mention that my husband, Ed, is a professional musician and he will have the Ed Wise Duo playing for the event! Lucky me – to have found him, a musician, when I myself have always been so in love with that art form!
Has it been a smooth road?
Oh, is there such a thing as a “smooth road?” I must have missed that part… no, not a smooth road. Going to college in Paris offered lots of growth, shall we say? My first language was Italian, so French came quite easily and I did so well that I passed all the exams for entry into Beaux-Arts in Paris… reading, writing, comprehension and orals. Back then, there was no junior year abroad. It was highly competitive and rather scary. But I got in and on a full scholarship. Once I arrived, it was a different story. I had not realized the speed at which the language was spoken – after all, it was my first time abroad. All classes were in French and in order to keep my scholarship, I had to maintain a B or better… and my art history class was a lecture class.
During the first art history class, I couldn’t understand any context, only a few words here or there, and I was sure this was the worst thing I’d ever wanted in my life. I took to recording all the lectures on an old tape recorder until one day another student suggested I go with him to meet his parents. So, off to Lyon we went for a weekend, and there I met my savior! She quickly made some phone calls and soon after I was enrolled in the Sorbonne emersion class for foreigners to learn French. I had called my mother back in that states to tell her I couldn’t handle this and needed to come home, to which my sweet and wonderfully supportive mom declared that she knew I could do this and she would not accept less. Three months at the Sorbonne and I was on my way. I kept that scholarship and after 4 years, I was fluent. WOW!
Another time, I had thought it would be fun to learn to run a gallery myself. I had had a mentor in college, a fabulous painter, who was quite wealthy and had left education to start his own gallery in Montreal. He contacted me and offered me a position in his gallery as well as a studio space to use when I was there. I soon discovered that he was not very good at keeping good records, so it was difficult to learn that part of the business. I loved the interaction with other artists and all the submissions that came, well… maybe not all of them as I soon discovered, it was almost impossible to keep up with that. But I had thought this might be a good way to get into the industry and if I was good at it, I might have found a way to help other artists as well as myself.
However, after 2 years, the challenges of keeping everything balanced began to take a toll and I found myself without the time I had hoped for my own work. Then, the owner announced he was opening another gallery in San Francisco and wouldn’t I love to move there! Well, actually no I wouldn’t, and back to applying for teaching jobs, I went!
Another time, I had thought it would be fun to learn to run a gallery myself. I had had a mentor in college, a fabulous painter, who was quite wealthy and had left education to start his own gallery in Montreal. He contacted me and offered me a position in his gallery as well as a studio space to use when I was there. I soon discovered that he was not very good at keeping good records, so it was difficult to learn that part of the business. I loved the interaction with other artists and all the submissions that came, well… maybe not all of them as I soon discovered it was almost impossible to keep up with that. But I had thought this might be a good way to get into the industry and if I was good at it, I might have found a way to help other artists as well as myself.
However, after 2 years, the challenges of keeping everything balanced began to take a toll and I found myself without the time I had hoped for my own work. Then, the owner announced he was opening another gallery in San Francisco and wouldn’t I love to move there! Well, actually no I wouldn’t, and back to applying for teaching jobs, I went!
Then there is gallery representation. I have been lucky. I was young and I worked hard with that old work ethic drummed into me from my Italian immigrant grandparents and my mom. I’ve had good galleries sell my work and then I’ve had not so good experiences. Maybe this is the same for most of us. However, one experience was rather devastating. It concerned representation I had in California. Los Angeles. They took a few paintings on trial basis and sold them all. I was then offered a solo exhibit. For one year I painted day and night, when I could and shipped 22 paintings, from small to very large, for the exhibit. We flew out for the opening which in itself was great. The show was exhibited for one month and what was sold was enough for the owners to want to keep me on as one of their artists. They pushed the larger paintings.
After a few months, I called the gallery to ask about a certain painting and they couldn’t find it. I had a friend in LA go and ask them about that painting and then they really looked… and found it. I asked it to be shipped to me as I had a buyer. (My contract allowed for this as long as I paid for shipping the work back to me.) When it arrived, it was damaged. It looked like a motorcycle tire had taken off on it, leaving rubber on the painting. Luckily, I had varnished this piece, and I was able to slowly and carefully clean it without disrupting the painting itself. It wasn’t a good omen for me, so I ended my relationship with them without any problems.
I’ve enjoyed wonderful gallery representation with great people and I’ve been lucky that I have not had a repeat or a bad experience since. However, there is always the issue today of shipping and cost and all the risk that artists take. It’s not easy.
For others, particularly for young women just starting out I would say first and foremost be true to yourself. Work, work, work, work! Work hard and find your “authentic voice,” your authentic you and way of working. You may learn all the valuable things needed from others as you go along, but don’t copy them. Instead, use them, incorporate them into who you are. Be your original, unique self. That is your gift to the world. After all, there is only one of you in all the world! It takes patience, commitment, discipline and the growing of some tough skin. I think that women today are in a much better place than before, however we are still in a struggle to gain equality. We know we are all equal, but the world is full of games. Do not fall for those! Never lower yourself or your standards to get where you want to go. Be courageous and work hard, do the homework, find where you fit in best. There is no easy way just as there is no smooth road. If you love what you do, if you have true passion for it, then work hard knowing you can do what is in your heart. What stops us is only ourselves. The choice is fear or love. It is not about what others say, or the attitudes, the thoughts, the negativity, the boundaries that are always trying to be imposed upon us as women. Don’t allow fear to enter. Be smart. Be really smart! Find ways, invent new ways, step outside the boxes, to make a decent living and support your passion while you are working toward your goals. There is no need to suffer to be an artist! Not in terms of having less than, looking less than – for me, that has always been a lie and very detrimental. Women in the arts is a necessity to effect positive forward progress in all cultures in our world today and to reach across boarders so that we can pull everyone into a more unified humanity.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into Marcia R Wise Fine Art story. Tell us more about the business.
I am an oil painter. What sets me apart is the way I use color and that I have an original, artistic voice in the structure of my work. I look for this in all art I view – originality. I am dismayed when I can see a certain type of work repeated by many artists. I look for the difference, the truth within the voice of the artist, and as a teacher, I have focused to bring that unique voice out of each student and into the light of day. Fearlessness! I thrive in being bold and fearless in my approach to my work. Oh, well… the way I live my life, too, many would say. I say, “Go for the joy!” What do we have to lose? Nothing and we have everything to gain when we open to passions that give us that kind of experience. Spread the love!
Do you have any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general? What has worked well for you?
Both finding a mentor/teacher with whom I have resonated and networking have worked well for me. I have always told my students to take many classes and workshops with teachers whose work resonates with them. I have also found mentors in college professors and some who have introduced me to others.
Networking is most amazing to me. And with technology, all these types of things become easier. Network with other artists, teachers, and ask questions. Join groups like critique groups or discussion groups so that you begin to meet more and more like-minded people. Think of it as a Facebook kind of thing – it grows exponentially as you network and reach out. Attend art openings, artist talks, etc. Visit lots of museums and sit and look, really look by taking your time. Join museums, the have all kinds of wonderful ways to find more networking possibilities. With the right attitude, the right people will be found.
Pricing:
- Most paintings run from 12″ x 12″ at $500.00 to larger sizes up to $8,000.00
Contact Info:
- Address: 450 Harrison Avenue, Studio 403, Boston, MA 02118
- Website: https://www.marciarwise.com
- Phone: 508-468-6928
- Email: mewise498@comcast.net
- Instagram: https://www.imstagram.com/marciafineartist/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/marcia.wise.52
- Other: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcia-wise-a8b00036/
Image Credit:
Laurie DeVault
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