Lee Baldwin visits Mary Ann Sears

Surrealism lives in Prescott, Arizona

By Lee Baldwin, June, 2005

As we tour art galleries and frame shops, we regularly see reproduced artworks with handwritten notations such as 398/500, a printer's convention indicating the 398th print from an edition of 500. The works of Mary Ann Sears bear a mark that is similar yet more intriguing. In the lower left corner you will find the pencil mark 1/1, meaning simply: this is the only print from an edition of one.

Welcome to the world of Mary Ann Sears monotypes. The works are as original as they are unique.

A monoprint is a single impression on paper made from an inked or painted plate via a press. A monotype is a monoprint with additional work done directly to the printed image. Monoprints and monotypes are not printing, in the usual sense of producing multiple copies from an original image, but the creative products of an art form.


LEFT: Enter Without Knocking
8 in. X 16 in. Mixed-media monotype on paper.
Another work that rewards contemplation, this image is a skillful counterpoint of color, form, and movement.

Monoprints originated at least as far back as the early 1600s, and the list of artists who explored the technique reads like a who's who. Degas, Pissarro, Gaugin, Picasso, Chagall, Miro', Dubuffet, Matisse and many others have produced hundreds of exceptional monoprint and monotype images.

Raised in Phoenix, Sears earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts, with distinction, from ASU in 1975, taught grade school and High School art for two years, then found a position with an interior design studio in Phoenix. This latter experience strengthened her connection with graphic design, so evident in her work today.

Sears later joined the Phoenix Art Group, and her design sense shifted to decorative landscapes not unlike those of French Impressionist painter Claude Monet. This work placed Sears's attention on the play of lights and darks, the sense of layering, which became the framework of her current design vocabulary.

The former Smith-Krol gallery on Gurley St. first displayed Sears's monotypes. Should it be surprising that they sold well right away, considering the year was 1993 and the population of Prescott less than 20,000? Sears reckons those pieces went to visitors and local collectors alike. The Baleri Building on North Cortez St. purchased 19 Sears monotypes for its lobbies and corridors. She received a commission for offices at The Crossings, and Prescott Unity Church has several Sears originals in its permanent collection.

With juried exhibitions and other key shows literally across the country since 1976, including the Los Angeles Art Expo and the Phippen Private Collectors Exhibition, Sears has experienced broad acceptance of a personal art form that is expressive, idiosyncratic, and communicative.

Although Sears's monotype technique uses inks and a hand-crank press, it is not printing in the usual sense, for it does not seek to produce multiples of an original in another medium. Rather, Sears uses the brayers, acrylic plates, and press as steps in a process, a hybrid art medium, which creates the original. The beauty of monotype arises from spontaneity and uniqueness.

Sears begins by applying oil-based lithography inks to a smooth plexiglas plate, using rollers and brushes, then marks into the wet ink surface with a variety of tools such as palette knife, sharp stick, and other implements. She uses cotton swabs and other methods to remove ink from areas of the plate, areas which will thereby remain white in the print. Finally she places the wet plate on her press and makes a single impression on 100% rag paper.


RIGHT: Inclination to Bloom
22 in. X 30 in. Mixed-media monotype on paper.
The stage-like setting, the hush of outer darks, the melodic movements of the shapes all evoke a sense of dance and high drama.

At this stage the work is a monoprint, but when the ink is dry, Sears continues with 'top work,' adding to the printed image with direct application of acrylic paints, colored pencil, inks, copper leaf, and other media suitable to her design vision. The end result is a classic monotype, but as employed by Sears, the technique is a playful process that results in images uniquely her own.

Stylistically, Sears was attracted to and somewhat guided by the works of Russian-born French Expressionist Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), and Spanish surrealist painter Joan Miro' (1893-1983). Moreover, the stage-like settings, the sweeping, poetic, and rhythmic strokes, attest to another fundamental stylistic influence, her love of dance, which was her minor field at ASU.

Now that we have brought up the S-word, surrealism, can we truly mention Prescott, Arizona in the same sentence? Although the match is at first surprising, the broad acceptance of this work through gallery sales, exhibitions, and private collections provides a clear affirmative. Mary Ann Sears has figuratively blazed a trail which connects this former mining town, home of the World's Oldest Rodeo, to the main street of modern surrealist abstraction. And as you should see for yourself, her work is quite at home on Whiskey Row.

Mary Ann Sears monotypes may be seen at:

Van Gogh's Ear Gallery
156 South Montezuma St.
Prescott, AZ 86303
928 776 1080

Raku Gallery
250 Hull Avenue
Jerome, AZ 86331
928 639 0239

Pinnacle Gallery
23417 N. Pima Rd. Suite 161
Scottsdale, AZ 85255
480 563 9800