Michelle Spark
MICHELLE SEIGEI SPARK
michellespark.neT @michelle_spark
ARTIST BIO:
B.A. ~ Carnegie Mellon Univrerdity
B.F.A. ~ University of Penna. Grad. School of Design
M.F.A. ~ painting ~ Queens College
M.A. ~ Art Therapy ~ NYU, ATR-BC
Adjunct Prof. NYU Grad Art Therapy -1984-1997
Sr. Creative Arts Therapist in a metropolitan New York hospital
A SHORT PERSONAL HISTORY
Born (1951) Phila. to second generation Jewish parents, in old suburbs under 100 year old oaks, maples and roses. My early creative life was an illusion of peace in the outsid/backyard; in opposition to the psychoanalytic and social consciousness of therapist parents, the heartbreak of Vietnam, race riots and suppression, and drop out experimentation. However, making art has always been a refuge and a sacred space for me.
I am forever grateful to my many teachers: Gandy Brodie, Rackstraw Downes, Yvonne Jacquettte, Rudy Burkhardt, Bill Sullivan, Neil Welliver, Louis Finkelstein, Bob Bimelin, Rose Mary Beck, and Anthony Kirk.
After college and grad school (see above) I worked as a Senior Creative Arts Therapist in NYC in the Psychiatry department of St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital, and as an Adjunct Prof.NYU’s Grad Department of Art Therapy. I moved to the Catskills in 1998, where I am a Zen Buddhist practitioner at Zen Mountain Monastery studying first with Daido Loori Roshi and now with Shugen Arnold Roshi.
ARTIST STATEMERT
Several years ago I turned from painting in oil on canvas to making hand painted paper collage in a medium sized format. Painting textured papers makes possible vivid relationships of color, shape, and fluidity. The tactile nature of shape becomes line.
I enjoy cutting and arranging imagery into a collage; using figurative imagery so that the form is accessible to people.
My studio intention: to enter with open heart and mind, (no thoughts!) to accept all the world’s feelings and sensations. My collages come from the freedom to imagine all creatures and experiences with the desire to receive this life. Open to feeling joy, frustration, humility and sorrow. Ultimately not knowing what will happen here and trusting the very ground of being.