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She came from Deerfield in western Mass. last April in the migratory pattern of many a grandparent – to be closer to her grandchildren, and she brought with her a lifetime of color. Marcia Wise has been an oil painter for many years, inspired by the natural world and the mystery of nature. For her, “it’s all about color,” she says. “I’m passionate about color.”
“For many years, I’ve been a representational artist, even in my abstract work you can (rec) what I’ve been depicting,” says the Cape Cod native, who’s no stranger to these parts. Recently, she says, she’s “delving into a whole new area.”
The need to create started “really young and it started with color,” says Wise. “I was very sensitive to color,” says the artist, who came from a family of musicians and who even married a musician. She points out that creativity was all around her as a child, with Italian immigrant grandparents, including a grandmother who could “make something out of nothing,” and a grandfather who was a shoemaker. Wise’s mother led her to expressing herself with her hands, “and color is what led me to put things on paper,” says Wise, who took her first private painting lessons at age 9.
“My work reflects changes in my life,” says Wise. “You can mark your time through what you’re producing.” Wise says her greatest inspiration comes from nature, and she will express her emotions about scenes through her painting. The interactions of color and light still fascinate her, but lately, her work “is more like a probing meditation, a discovery that happens within myself I’m wanting to bring forth, now.”
As someone who was born near the ocean, Wise has a wealth of ocean scenes she’s painted, but she also finds inspiration through her travels. Most recently, she’s spent a month in India, a place she wanted to go since she was young. She has found she wants to capture the colors she saw in the country, and specifically how the colors surrounded the women and the work she saw them do there.
All of India is so colorful,” says Wise, who explains she’s expressing “in my own way what my experience was, bringing that here so people can see that, because there’s no explaining it.”
Wise prefers to use oils, and she explains it’s best to view her work in person, because of the texture of her work.
“I do use brushes, but I primarily use palette knives and putty knives to paint with. You need to see the work in person. As I build a painting, I use more non traditional painting instruments – palette knives, putty knives. I have one workshop I do that’s all experimental tools for people who want to let go and have the adventure of self discovery – I used to call it full color workshop.”
In fact, in March, Wise’s work will be up at the Franklin Art Center, and she’s also working with Linda and Ian Kabat on putting together some workshops. “I’ve always loved to teach,” says the artist, who has a studio at her home in Norfolk and also teaches workshops and weeklong classes in the summertime all over New England. “I really love to share the joy of color and expression with other people.”
In addition to planning some workshops at Franklin Art Center, says Wise, “I will also have a show at the Norfolk Public Library in September, through the Norfolk Cultural Council.” Wise has also been talking with the educational director at the Art Complex Museum in Duxbury, where she and her husband have collaborated on art/music workshops.
Now that she is in the area, Wise hopes to continue doing what she loves.
“The retirement thing is not in my genetics. I don’t think I want it to be in my vocabulary,” says Wise, who says she’s been fortunate to paint, what she loves, for so many years. “Some people wait until they retire, but I feel really blessed that I can keep going.”
To find out more about Marcia Wise, visit www.marciarwise.com.