maryann_webster

Science in Art: Maryann Webster

Maryann Webster was born in San Francisco and grew up in Northern California. She now resides in Salt Lake City, UT. She received her BA in Art from Brigham Young University and MFA from the University of Utah where she continues to teach part-time. She has received many awards, including the Purchase Award, Cup Collection from the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts; and a Merit Award from the Feats of Clay National Exhibition, Lincoln, CA; and an Utah Arts Council Artist Grant. Her work has been shown at numerous exhibitions and museums, most recently at the N.C.E.C.A. Show “Interpreting the Figure” at the Lawrence Gallery, Portland, OR, and can be found in public and private collections across the country. Her work is shown by the Lacoste and Ferrin galleries. Several articles have been written about her work and its inspiration, including “After Palissy” by Anne C. Wollman in Ceramic Art and Perception , Issue 60, 2005 and “Maryann Webster – Motherboards, Mutant Gardens, and the Human Condition” by Shelly E. Smith in Woman's Art Journal , Volume 26,#1, 2005. As her work suggests, she is an active environmentalist. Currently, she is active at preventing Utah from becoming the US repository for high level nuclear waste. Her outspoken activism led to her being appointed to the Utah Governor's Panel charged with preventing these nuclear waste plans from reaching fruition. As of 2004, the plan for the nuclear waste dump in Utah is on hold.

Artist's Statement (visit the galleries linked below to see the named work not depicted here):

Clay is a sensuous, tangible medium that allows the translucence of painting with glass. I inherited from my father, a microbiology researcher, an alchemist's addiction to experimentation. Clay, the earth element is acted upon by the elements of water, air and fire, transforming mud to glass. Alchemists claimed they could create simulated human “homunculi” using clay as flesh. I projected the idea that spirit resides in matter onto contemporary dilemmas. Materialism in our society is leading us on a destructive path as our lifestyle increasingly exceeds the earth's ability to sustain us. The increasing awareness of apocalyptic ideas in our time seems to reflect a spiritual decline in contemporary civilization. Appreciating the exquisite design and aesthetic rewards in nature's varied patterns and how this relates to the fragile state of our existence is directly related to our very survival. Postmodern obsession with apocalyptic thinking has its parallel in the Middle Ages which then gave way to a rediscovery of nature during the Renaissance. My ideas, influenced by these styles, reflect concerns for nature and healing, as well as the spiritual conflict between nature and unbridled technology.

Bernard Palissy's late Renaissance basins of idealized nature forms inspired series of basins showing mutant, damaged or altered nature. Monsanto Pond is about an actual environmental problem in Anniston, Alabama. A deformed fish was pulled from a pond there and when researchers studied it to find the cause, they discovered that Monsanto had polluted the entire town with PCBs, a chemical that causes birth defects, genetic mutations, and cancer. Monsanto was required to clean up the soil around the homes in Anniston. It is fascinating to me that scientists have been able to splice genes form the flounder, a cold water fish, into tomato plant chromosomes to make the tomatoes more resistant to cold. In Shallow Edge of the Gene Pool , mixed plant and animal species are shown in a pool in various states of mutation, with the results unknown. The results from Monsanto's genetically modified corn are, however, definitely problematic. Besides killing good and bad insects indiscriminately, the pollen can migrate to adjacent corn fields and change the natural corn species there to genetically modified corn. When this has happened, Monsanto was able to sue the hapless natural corn farmer for patent violation. The courts, however, seem to not recognize the very real problem of genetic pollution. In Mutant Pool with Lobster, genetically modified corn creatures are swimming in the natural environment of the pool.

The icons are all porcelain tiles with china paint, enclosed by stoneware frames. Cybermuse and the detail of Motherboard III deal with some of the impacts of technology. The phrase at the top of Cybermuse , “All watched over by machines of loving grace...” is from Richard Brautigan's poem (“All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace”, 1968) , which wryly stated that computers will free us from our labors and join us back to nature. Overly Idealized Portrait of the Artist with Muses and Demons has moth spirits, bee muses and death demons. I feel that the most engaging self-portraits reveal something of the artist's inner self. An important self-portrait by Henry Church portrays the artist with Greek muses hovering like fairies about his head. My response was to evoke my own imagined muses and demons. The bee muses suggest that the artist's creative powers emerge while in a “bemused” state. Others are moth spirits which reveal the artist's concern for the loss of nature. This reflects my concern for the death of beautiful insects caused by careless application of science with a lack of understanding of its ultimate impact on nature. One of the demons is the atomic demon with wings of a Death's Head Moth, another reference to enemies of nature. There is a scull-headed grasshopper as a plague and pestilence demon. The narrative symbolism is left open to the viewer's interpretation, with the idea that all symbols ultimately belong to the viewer and the artist's role is to merely set them forward. The armored beetle muse with the paintbrush has a motto on its shield, “ Dormiens Vigila ”, which means, “While sleeping, watch.”--good advice for any student of the subconscious.

Reliquaries served as decorative repositories for the relics and bones of Christian saints. These 21 st Century reliquaries are containers for (ceramic representations) lost species and ruins ecosystems. The Moth Spirit Reliquary deals with concerns of the death of beautiful insects due to the careless use of chemicals and genetically engineered crops such as genetically modified corn that create insecticides that kill harmless insects indiscriminately along with the crop pests. Lost Garden Reliquary and Endangered Earth Reliquary have destroying angels and mushroom clouds with the B-29 bombers above. The Lost Garden Reliquary includes Eve with a hose, rather than a snake, trying to replenish the pond in which fish are flopping. It is an allegory for the loss of nature caused by man's technological carelessness.

The puppet or doll figures (Effigies) were influenced by the idea of “homunculi.” They also reflect the idea of a narrative on the surface of the body that tells the life of the individual, much like scars or tattoos. Water Baby reflects the fact that negative impacts to the environment are also a negative impact within out bodies. Host figures found in Africa and Pre-Columbian Meso America are human forms with sacred or magical objects in the body cavity that reflect the idea that the body cavity is the center of the life force. Guardian Figure was influenced by these magical host figures. Good Twin, Evil Twin expresses the classic struggle between the opposing forces of good and evil, both universally and on an individual level. Just as human skin begins to reveal the spiritual and physical history of an individual, the sculpture's tattoos reflect a universal narrative of duality. This piece also addresses the enormous contention in contemporary society about whose ideologies are good and whose are evil.

Visit the galleries for more images of Webster's work in these four art forms:

Basins Gallery

Icons Gallery

Reliquaries Gallery

Effigies Gallery