Joyce Melander

I began my artistic career as a painter, working in a photorealistic style that juxtaposed three-dimensional subjects with a flattened background. That flatness served to isolate my subject matter, allowing me to focus on formal qualities rather than representational ones. Eventually, that emphasis on form alone became paramount for me, and I started experimenting with additional materials: fiber, beads, and wood. I had always admired the backs of my canvases, considering them beautiful textiles. Ultimately, I stitched through the canvas and recognized it was a warp. Through these experiments, I discovered I wasn’t confined to a loom; I could make the work go in any direction I desired. This break from realism provided a welcome chance to incorporate elements of sculpture and three-dimensionality into my work, serving as a vehicle for exploring different colors and textures. I live and work in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a place where the desert landscape and crisp, bright colors inevitably find their way into the palette and forms of my work. Over the years, my curiosity has driven me to explore various media and techniques, ranging from paint to wool, from drawing to beading. Each medium has posed its own challenges. My commitment remains to examine each one with respect for the artisans and artists who have perfected their use in the past. The project becomes to integrate them all in a new and unique way.

Joyce Melander is an artist fascinated by the constructed object. Using a variety of processes such as weaving, crochet, embroidery and sewing, the artist’s intricately assembled sculptures carry traditional craft methods into the context of fine art. She incorporates a wide array of materials in her work, bringing wool, glass beads, textiles and wood veneers into a rich, almost musical, interplay of texture and rhythm. She lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a place whose desert landscape and crisp, bright colors inspire the artist’s vividly hued palette and organic shapes. Melander brings this inspiration into the studio not to duplicate the outside world, but to synthesize her surroundings and observations into something entirely new. A lifelong pianist, Melander plays daily, incorporating musical terms into many of her titles: Rondo, Allegro Non Troppo, Glissando. Her elaborately patterned, delicately worked sculptures, often arranged in lilting, organic configurations, bring to mind the musical abstractions of Kandinsky, whose fascination with the “sound of color” established the artist as a pioneer of western abstraction. Melander’s approach is a more postmodern one, preoccupied with artisanal process, material opulence and extravagant construction. Her work is held in numerous public collections throughout the country, and has been exhibited in numerous galleries and institutions.

3-D, Collage/Mixed Media, Fiber Arts, Multi-Media, Sculpture