Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Rabble Rouser


                                             




 








                                  
An inspiring visit with Michael Frimkess and Magdalena Suarez Frimkess
Magdalena works everyday doing her drawings with glaze on pots that Michael had made or pieces that she formed herself.  We just happened to visit the day they unloaded the kiln! This is a portion of conversation from Magdalena in an interview done in 2001...

DR. KARLSTROM: Describe some of your favorite subjects that you liked to paint.
MRS. FRIMKESS: Well, I started copying the Mexicans first, I think. That was the one thing I used to do, copying the Aztecs and all those, because I felt more familiar with my culture. I tried to give something of myself. So I started making cartoons with the Aztecs, making it to the nowadays. And then, without knowing, came everything then, came the Mickey Mouse and came the Snow White, came everybody, so they were all mixed up.
DR. KARLSTROM: But the Mickey Mouses and Snow Whites were things that you chose.
MRS. FRIMKESS: Oh, yeah, for the particular day that I was working on, yeah.
DR. KARLSTROM: Well, did you and Michael talk about how to decorate these?
MRS. FRIMKESS: Never. We don't talk. We really don't talk. I'll be crazy if I talk to him. So I avoid.
DR. KARLSTROM: Even about the work?
MRS. FRIMKESS: Oh, less. Never. Like we talk about the dog, the food, never about even the glaze. First time I started working with the glaze, he said, "You figure it out." He didn't help me.
DR. KARLSTROM: Did you figure it out?
MRS. FRIMKESS: Yeah, I did.
                                          
Text from The Smithsonian Archives of American Art an                                          
Oral history interview with Michael and Magdalena Suarez Frimkess, 2001 Mar. 8-Apr. 17                                          
Link to full interview here