'The Mother and the Monk': Holyoke artist showcases Zen-inspired art

By LAUREN MODISETTE

Published on July 27, 2007

After struggling with her art for 10 years, Gineen Cooper found her creative inspiration through the ancient teachings of Zen.

"I had a breakthrough attributed to the Zen philosophy, said the Holyoke artist. "The ideas of Zen were the clearest explanation of reality in my mind." She said that Zen enabled her to silence her mind and let her body move.

Through August the results of Cooper's breakthrough are on display at the Amherst Town Hall in an exhibit called "The Mother and The Monk." Her work was selected by the Amherst Public Art Commission for a three-month display as part of the Visiting Art Program.

Cooper moved to the Valley in 1994 when she was a teenager. "I was sort of a blocked artist when I moved here," she said. "I made very little work but surrounded myself with art."

Her block finally came to an end in 2001 when she joined Zen on Main in Northampton and began meditating regularly. "Now the work comes out like it's a flood," she said.

Cooper's work has been exhibited in 16 group and solo shows throughout the Valley. In 2005, she graduated from Holyoke Community College with her associate's degree in visual art.

The collection on view at town hall is divided among images of a child monk and Cooper self-portraits representing "the mother." The monks are intaglio prints on fabric, wallpaper or aluminum foil, while the mothers are intaglio prints and acrylics on fabric.

Cooper explained that an intaglio print is created by layering wax on a metal plate, etching a design into it with a sharp tool, then dipping the plate into acid. Once the plate has been created, Cooper heats it, inks it, and runs it through a press.

"It's a very old technique," she said, "[but] I like to break the rules. I started printing on tin foil, old wallpaper, plastic and velvet.

"I think that on many levels I go from the traditional to the experimental," she added. "Like the tin foil, for instance. I didn't know what was going to happen."

One tin-foil experiment in the show is "New Age Monk," in which, Cooper said, the foil represents fragility.

"I hope it doesn't speak of spirituality," she said, pausing to consider the thought, "but I think it does."

The monk images portray a child of four or five and were inspired by a photograph taken by National Geographic's Steve McCurry. Cooper's favorite piece is located in the lobby and is called "Tribal Monk." It is an intaglio print on old wallpaper framed in green and burgundy velvet. The monk has a pensive look, expressive of his meditative state.

"I love the markings that unintentionally came through when I printed it," she said. "It made me think of some tribe - I liked the idea of a tribal monk."

The self-image Cooper uses in the "mother" series was inspired by Japanese masters like 19th-century artist Utagawa Hiroshige. "The mother series came from the fact that I don't yet have kids," Cooper said, "and it's been important for me to examine how difficult the job of mother' is.

"Before I have children I need to learn how to nurture the spiritual life of the divine child within," she said. "I think that mothering is the most difficult [job, which requires] unwavering dedication and commitment - that to me is very astonishing."

She said that it's important to her to portray powerful women in her art. "It's such a shift from centuries of women being portrayed as helpless, limp objects," she said. For example, in "Pelican Mother's Love-in," Cooper painted her own portrait on a large piece of fabric with a loud and colorful 1970s-style floral design. The "mother" is holding her right hand in a position known in Buddhism as a mudra, in this case the Vitarka Mudra position, with her index finger and thumb touching.

The Vitarka Mudra is a gesture made by the female Buddhist diety Arya Tara, known as the "mother of liberation." The piece features Cooper's self-portrait surrounded by a flock of pelicans.

"As a species, the [pelican] mothers were known to make great sacrifices for their children," Cooper said. "I'm trying to form a positive association around the word sacrifice. It doesn't have to connote pain or loss, maybe just the sacrifice of lower pursuits for ones that are higher."

She said all the pieces in the show were created using her process of releasing conscious control and letting the work create itself.

"There's a certain approach [to art] that requires fearlessness," Cooper said, "[allowing] whatever you're doing to create itself, without judgment, is not something I learned in school."