By Cali Bagby
In a small, remote studio on the south end of the island, Jerome Marshak, sits at his desk. He watches the clouds float by and the mountains rise out of the fog. He listens as the wind shifts and the water laps against the rocky shoreline.
In this peace and tranquility, he spends his days drawing abstract and minimalist art.
For 30 years, Lopez’s scenery has inspired his work, but now he’s preparing for a totally different landscape of sky scrapers, crowded streets and the bright city lights of New York City.
“It’s a dramatic paradigm shift from one universe to another,” he said. “Now I’ll work in a place that’s my polar opposite. What the heck, I’m ready to try anything.”
He’s making the journey because he was recently awarded a residency grant by the Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation, which provides artists with their own studio for one year in New York City.
“I’ll tell you the truth, I was surprised that I got the grant,” said Marshak, who will leave the island in August.
At 69, Marshak’s is gaining a following in New York.
It’s all due to a series of fortunate events and a lifetime of persistence and hard work.
After working on his own for years, Marshak, at a friend’s urging, decided to submit his art for The Drawing Room, a prestigious gallery in New York City.
After submitting his work, the curator of The Drawing Room asked if he’d show his work in the gallery.
Marshak was stunned, but it was only the first step. After the success of his first show, the curator asked if Marshak would submit some of his work to a benefit show and if he would come to New York.
So he did, and met crowds of people who admired his work.
“They just got it,” said Marshak.
The work
While in the big city, Marshak collaborated with another Lopezian artist, Colin Snapp, who works as an artist in New York City.
Snapp created a video and soundtrack to go along with a 60-inch scroll of Marshak’s art.
The video,“shocked” Marshak at first, but he gradually came to see how this collaboration could grow into something larger.
That’s where the grant proposal for the Sharpe Foundation comes in.
Marshak plans to recruit a dozen young videographers to create videos with soundtracks of his art and then have a symposium to discuss the videos. The symposium will also be filmed. Then the installation will feature original rolls, excerpts from the art videos and videos of the symposium.
Snapp has known Marshak since he was a kid and now as a fellow artist, describes Marshak’s art as abstract maps, which survey light patterns and the natural landscape.
“His work blurs the line between several artistic movements: conceptual, minimalism and land art,” Snapp said. “I always felt drawn to his work in the sense, that it poses questions.”
For Marshak, those questions are what draws him to abstract art, which embodies the emotions of the viewer.
“If I’m not feeling good about myself I see nothing,” he said. “Its like looking up at the clouds and seeing either a lot or nothing.”
Marshak’s work uses plexiglass templates, which help create lines and shapes in his art. The templates are symbolic of light, mountains, clouds and other aspects of nature.
“My work is very reductive, abstract,” he said. “At the risk of sounding funny, it’s almost intellectual.”
The artist
Marshak came to Lopez to escape southern California. He worked as a carpenter to support his family. When his five children went off to his college and his marriage ended he went back to “what I always hoped I would live long enough to do.”
He spends up to 40 hours a week drawing in his studio. He jokes that for an hour each day he doubts himself.
“I think anyone with creative urges has moments of self-doubt,” he said. “It’s a process of reflection and its hard not to reflect and be critical.”
Even with his recent success, he still faces several challenges. The grant pays for a studio, but not for lodging or other living expenses.
Marshak is still looking for funding, he spends at least 25 hours on one grant at a time and is currently filling out an application for a Guggenheim Fellowship. In the meantime, he is asking the community to consider purchasing a piece of art to help support his year in New York.
“Either way I’m going for it,” he said. “I’m gonna go even if I don’t get any help.”
It is this spunky attitude that has inspired, younger artists like Snapp.
“I really admire his enthusiasm for artistic growth even at an older age,” Snapp said. “So many older artists seem so jaded and Jerome seems to be taking on the world as if he were eighteen.”
For Marshak, he’s simply doing what comes naturally.
“It’s who I am, the work,” Marshak said. “When I’m drawing its like a guitarist playing a guitar, you transcend, kind of act outside yourself. It’s a great feeling.”
For more info, call Marshak 468-3010 or email him at marsh@rockisland.com. You can view his work at jeromemarshak.com.
