Margie Mee
I moved to Ashland ten years ago, and purchased a piece of paradise on five acres outside of town. "There is no place like home" and I have truly found it living here.
Having always considered my life as art, being next to nature has helped me define what "makes me tick" when it comes to creating. At first I painted, inspired by the landscapes all around me. I began to feel very much a part of this land, and knew that we were connected in a way that I had never imagined living in the city. My work reflected what I saw in Nature, and the animals I was living with on the land. Soon I decided not to frame, or use glass. I used whatever I found in the streets or what was thrown away. I mixed my mediums. I wanted to feel free from what was "expected" or often taught, and didn't want my work to be "preserved" or precious".
In nature, you and I have a birth, live our lives, and eventually experience death. My work reflects that same process. With a bit of whimsy thrown in to give spice! Life does, after all, require a sense of humor!
Earlier, I painted furniture, and found I really got excited painting around and under chairs, loved sticking found objects on my paintings. I was attempting to make things look three-dimensional. Somehow using perspective was like telling a lie, because it wasn't real. Three-dimensional work seemed closer to reality for me.
Eventually, I realized my medium would be sculpture. I was delighted when Sam Campbell decided to join me, a little over two years ago. We began to create metal sculpture from old tools and farm implements; some have been hand-forged and all of them are beautiful to me. I love recycling "junk" that has been discarded, and welding them into my idea of ART!
We have done birds, capturing their movement as they "take off". Have loved making things that our metal pieces seem to suggest to us. We do accept commissions when our vision and the clients have something in common that seems irresistible!