Traces of History and Radical Innovations

In Paintings by Mariella Bisson

For well over a century the topography of New England and eastern New York State has attracted visual artists. The landscape gave rise to the first truly independent American art movement, The Hudson River School. In spite of the American painters’ subsequent discovery of the magnificence of the West the Hudson Valley landscape still captivates artists and nature enthusiast alike.

Much of this attraction could be attributed to the dichotomy of expectations, based on a rather idealized vision of the Eastern states, and the hard facts on the ground. Here the quaint towns of Connecticut, pastures of Vermont or New Hampshire are abated by deep ravines, dense forests or cliffs, often places of eminent danger. The character of the landscape changes almost magically from a bucolic mood into a place of raging wilderness within a matter of seconds. The Catskills, Adirondacks and Hudson Valley offer painterly vistas of majestic open spaces, but also dramatic views of isolated spaces, unexpected hidden valleys, rushing waterfalls, and meandering brooks where stone formations interrupt the flow and where we are reminded of nature untamed and in constant motion. Such mountain brooks, large or small, are plentiful and have inspired countless paintings, poetry and musical compositions.

The famous Alfred Bierstadt painting Mountain Brook, 1863, is an exquisite example as is the work of his brothers Charles and Edward, photographers, who documented the same place in Franconia Notch in the White Mountains of New Hampshire a few years earlier – and are also a lasting influence on images made by painter, Mariella Bisson. This was the visual heritage that permeated places of her childhood and that had a profound influence on her lifelong dedication to art. Mariella grew up in St. Johnsbury in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, in a family that valued the arts and literature – Mariella’s father was a painter and sculptor, her mother an English literature professor at a local college. When she was born, her family was renting a house from the poet, Robert Frost. Mariella loved books and from an early age spent innumerable hours in the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum - a remarkable institution that served the town as library, social hub and an art gallery. The Athanaeum houses Bierstadt’s largest work, “Yosemite Half-Dome, and Mariella fell under the spell of that exceptional collection of 19th century landscape painting, amassed by the Fairbanks brothers. She felt magic stirring in works by Sanford R. Gifford, Albert Bierstad, and Asher B. Durand – and she was determined to become an artist.

She earned her BFA in Drawing at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and although she knew her true calling was painting she found employment in the Brooklyn artistic renaissance of the 1980’s. She worked for the NYC Department of Parks and Recreation in Prospect Park as curator for the stately but notoriously difficult spaces within The Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch in Grand Army Plaza. Mariella showed early works by artists who were emerging in the 80’s including Florence Neal, Whitfield Lovell, Alison Saar, Nancy Azara and Fred Wilson. She organized a significant show for sculptor Mel Edwards. However Mariella’s love of painting prevailed and in order to find time and space to work she sought artists residencies among them Byrdcliffe and the Woodstock School of Art. After 26 years in New York City, and the events of 9/11, she relocated permanently to the Catskills – a decision that allowed her artistic practice to truly flourish. Mariella has now reached the stage when she can dedicate herself to her art full time – and with astonishing results. The scope of her work is now being augmented by in-depth explorations and paintings of the Smoky Mountains in North Carolina.

Mariella’s pieces develop from sketches, drawings and/or small watercolors, that she executes en plein air. Later in the studio these are translated into larger works. In the initial field works she documents color, shape, light and the general composition of the place she sees. These factual compositions are subject to alteration in subsequent studio works to accentuate features the artist considers to be essential. She conveys not only a physical likeness but also the mood and essence of a place. She contemplates the particulars of a location that has initially impressed her and seeks to communicate a deeper spiritual meaning inherent to the place. This partially conceptual approach where the imagination, emotion and intuition meet reality is prevailing at this current stage of her work. Her theoretical knowledge of art history, natural history and depth of her academic training is evident. As a very serious and dedicated artist Mariella has carefully studied landscape painters of the past, including European masters such as Cezanne, the Skagen School of Denmark, the Canadian Group of Seven, and Emily Carr alongside the Hudson River School painters, and subsequent 20th century masters Marsden Hartley, Milton Avery, Georgia O’Keefe and Charles Burchfield.

A thorough knowledge of historical works builds a solid foundation for the innovation in Mariella’s approach. She ably transforms existing landscape features into images that symbolize the essence of a place, moving observed reality into the embodiment of spiritual forces permeating the scene. Her primary technique in making large works is a combination of painting and collage. It is time consuming and elaborate. Nevertheless her simplification of forms into more geometric elements combined with the careful calibrating of light and shadow and her unexpected shifts in perspective, point to a unique approach to landscape painting. Here the artist masterfully weds the images of observed reality with a growing ability to re - envision existing elements in a new light, moving her entire composition into the realm bordering on abstraction.

The Sound of the Trees, 2018, is the perfect example. Boulders and a tree trunk with its powerful roots are solidified into bold geometric shapes that signify reality as well an abstract idiom.

Collage technique revolutionized 20th century art and Mariella’s extensively use of it now allows for the richness of her images. Collage profoundly changed Mariella’s work, allowing her to create textured surfaces that imply pictorial depth and bring intricate color schemes to her compositions. Sometimes sourced from her own older works on paper, supplemented by torn sheets of paper of various colors, Mariella modulates these paper shards as she would the brushstrokes. After they are adhered to her substrate and once they meet her compositional needs these fragments are sealed and then painted. In order to arrive at this method there were technical issues that needed to be solved. Paper is a material intensely sensitive to changes in temperature and humidity and as it contracts and expands. It affects the underlying material of the painting. While wood panels are more resilient to such fluctuation, they limit the size of the works and Mariella was searching for ways of applying collage elements to linen to create larger paintings. She credits master stretcher-builder David Wise of DNA Stretchers for his unique design custom-made for her work. The construction of the stretcher allows for all varied collaged and painted elements to coexist in perfect unity.

It was already mentioned that the Bisson family lived in a house owned by poet Robert Frost. Many of his extraordinary poems celebrated the New England landscape with its peculiar mixture of dramatic ruggedness and poetic tranquility.

Similar qualities, translated into visual terms, could be associated with Mariella’s work. And sometimes the poems inspire the painting’s titles, when the words prompt the artist to envision their relationship to the observed segment of particular place. Mariella’s painting called The Sound of Trees, depicts a Hemlock tree trunk firmly rooted in an inhospitable terrain of rocks where its roots are like strong limbs holding it firmly in place. The tree’s invisible crown, however, is seemingly always swaying to and fro and is sounding the desire to move, as in Frost’s words:

“They are that that talks of going

but never gets away;

and that talks no less for knowing,

as it grows wiser and older,

that now it means to stay.” 1

Married to the Brook, 2018, is another work that responds to Robert Frost’s poem entitled West Running Brook. It is a brook full of contraries finding its own way through its stony bed to reach an unknown, in fact unexpected, destination.

“We will both be married to the brook.

We will build a bridge across it, and the bridge shall be our arm thrown over it asleep beside it” 2

Pearson’s Falls, 2018, depicts a celebrated place in North Carolina. Articulated strata of the rugged stone ledges and rushing waters of the cascading waterfall are contrasted with the lace of foliage, leading our eye toward the lighter areas and ultimately toward the patch of sky visible through the foliage. The artist’s vision prompts us to contemplate an enhanced degree of reality, richer than any exact record of these existing elements. It is the artists’ privilege to enrich the record of the observed with visual ideas to urge us to return to a newly constructed image time and again and to discover ideas that seem at first to be hidden, revealing themselves only over repeated encounters with the work. It is also Mariella Bisson’s intention for her work - as she describes it: “When you stand up close, the shapes fracture apart, as if you were looking through a kaleidoscope. I hope there’s more to see every time you look at one of my paintings. I work slowly. I think deeply and I am presenting ideas that are serious issues in art, in nature, and in life. “

We should be equally serious while looking at Mariella’s work. Hers is a view of reality that transcends the visible where the artist invites us to enter a world of imagination and beauty. We should wholeheartedly accept this generous invitation.

Brooklyn, NY

1. Robert Frost ……..The Sound of Trees

2. Robert Frost ………West-running Brook

Charlotta Kotik is the independent curator, write and lecturer living in Brooklyn, NY. She was a Curator at the Albright Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo and later Curator and Head of the Department of Contemporary Art at Brooklyn Museum, where she is a Curator Emerita.