Mother and Child Paintings and Sculpture

"Mother and Child" ©Mary Montague Sikes

Early in my art career, I was intrigued by the painted images of "Mother and Child" throughout art history. The intense relationship of the mother with her children fascinated me. As a psychologist, I realized the importance of that initial contact of an infant with her mother. I recalled my early years and my own dependency on my mother as I grew.

The past couple of weeks, I have watched a baby robin hatched from a beautiful blue egg and grown into a fluffy feathered fledgling. All happened thanks to the constant care of its mother, and also its father. How amazing it was to see the male robin demonstrate with his own wings a fluttering flying motion. All the while, the female robin flew back and forth between the branches of a small cedar tree and the edge of a flower pot. This took place quite near an entrance door to our house. Robins are never there normally. The baby flew briefly, but it is now back in the nest still being fed by the adults. It looks a bit forlorn, as if fearful and lonely. Too bad it is an only child.

Babies of all kinds need attention. Mother and Child. That is a theme through life. I love the paintings I did featuring that subject. I cherish the abstract "Mother and Child" sculpture I did in cement and paint during the same time period.

Mother and Child. An universal theme that continues in art and in nature.

What Would I Do If I Couldn't Be a Writer?

In My Studio ©Mary Montague Sikes

This year, I am participating in a Blog Challenge for Marketing by Romance Writers, and this week's topic is what I would do if I couldn't write. That one is easy for me because I have always been both a writer and an artist. Without writing, which I can't imagine, I would devote full-time to painting.

The images inside my head would dance out triumphantly onto canvasses everywhere. My studio is full of blank and unfinished canvasses. That would be the case no more. I would experiment to my heart's content and sometimes race out into the world to paint en plein air.

Some days, I would pull out my hammer and chisel and sculpt away. After all, sculpture was one of my first loves in art. Channeling Henry Moore, I built up large sculptures with Keene's cement, soon finding they were too heavy to move without help. I thrived in the College of William and Mary studio setting under the instruction of my teacher and mentor, Carl Roseburg.

"Mother and Child" ©Mary Montague Sikes

My sculptures ©Mary Montague Sikes

Because of the difficulty of transporting my work and the length of time it took to create each piece, I gave up sculpture in favor of painting. I still love the three-dimensional, so many of my paintings are mixed-media with surface texture added.

Studio Paintings Unfinished ©Mary Montague Sikes

Like written stories, the images always dance through my mind. I long to fill the blank canvasses and the empty cradled boards with more of my fantasies and journeys of the imagination.

Light, Love, and Sculpture in Key West

Seward Johnson sculpture in Key West ©MM Sikes

When we landed in Key West, Florida last week, the first thing I noticed was the difference in the light there. The water, foliage, and even the animals have a very Caribbean appearance. The water and clouds reminded me of my Media General painting that sold at auction earlier this month. That painting was based on photographs I took while visiting islands in the lower Caribbean.

Seward Johnson sculpture ©MM Sikes

I also was amazed once again by the life-size pieces of sculpture on the roof that greet arriving visitors to the Conch Republic. I wonder, but didn't ask, if they, too, are by the prolific artist, Seward Johnson, who entertains tourists with his delightful creations on view outside the Art Museum by the docks. He has changed the one in front of the building and now has the sailor kissing the nurse after the WWII popular photograph. An earlier one at that location was of dancers from a different period of history.

Johnson sculptures on the airport roof ©Mary Montague Sikes

Seeing the Johnson sculptural renderings makes a visit the Key West worthwhile. I didn't go inside the Art Museum this time. However, I will never forget "The Boating Party" that Johnson fashioned after the famous Renoir painting.
His fantastic sculpture was on view at the museum several years ago. It was a perfect example of light, love, and sculpture.

A Beautiful Piece of Art, A Damaged Soul

"A New Heaven, A New Earth" copyright MMSikes

At the Petersburg Regional Art Center open house this month, I did my usual walk through the main gallery to view the work in the juried show. One piece especially stood out for me. It was a glorious and delicately polished wooden sculpture.

I thought, this belongs in a museum. It was probably the best art piece I've ever seen in a non-museum setting.

Later in the evening, I stood by an easel working on my painting demo when an older black man stopped to talk. It turned out that he was the sculptor who created the fabulous art work that I loved. As we talked, I learned that despite his amazing talent, this artist had not been a success in New York and was unable to find work.

"People were afraid of me," he confided. This was in the 1970s when so much racial turmoil existed.

His comment started me thinking. We judge people by first appearances. We are afraid of certain stereotypes.

Artists are unique people. We see beauty others sometimes overlook. We often care about the work we make and the process we use more that we care about selling the art piece to a stranger.

We are sensitive people. Every comment made can touch us or it can hurt us.

Sadly, we live in a world now where it is not easy to trust a stranger.

Do we have more stereotypes to fear than ever before? I think we do.

Guns are not the answer--having them or not. It doesn't matter.

The answer lies in the children. We need to build a world through them that does not have stereotypes to fear. A world without bullying.

A world where the spirit of an artist is revered.

A world that does not leave an artist with a damaged soul...

--Mary Montague Sikes

Fitness Makes the Cut

In the late 1980s, six Virginia artists created the "Woman as Muse" sculpture for the Virginia Caucus for the Arts. I was one of those artists, and my part of the expansive art piece that filled an entire gallery was "Physical Woman". The work was exhibited at the art museum in Roanoke, Virginia and was part of a national sculpture conference in Cincinnati, Ohio.

I chose "Physical Woman" because I already was seeing the need for writers and artists to have a routine of physical activity. Conditioning and playing tennis were also an important part of my lifestyle.

"If you have your health, you have everything," my mother often told me.

As with most other things, my mother was right.

Since the mid-1980s, I have kept on a regular schedule of exercise--step aerobics three times a week and tennis three times each week as well. Writers do a lot of sitting in front of their computers, so we need the physical break. I've found if you keep up a routine, you are less likely to break it. My fitness routine has helped me stay in good physical condition.

Although you may need to give up some writing or painting time, nothing is more important than good health. For me, fitness makes the cut.

Physical Woman

Do you make time for fitness in your life? I'd like to know. Really, how important is exercise to you?