Madness of the Muses the Art of Ingrid Dee Magidson
The post-obit inspiring essay reveals Ingrid's creative journeying into art. She wrote this in gratitude to all the people who accept influenced her creative endeavors, but too to inspire promise in budding artists. Truly annihilation is possible.
Originally published in the book Madness of the Muses – The Fine art of Ingrid Dee Magidson, Stratumentis Publishing, 2013, all rights reserved.
Looking Forward and Back by Ingrid Dee Magidson
I was born an artist.
It took me nigh 40 years to discover that. Looking back, it all lines up in a pattern or pattern that I couldn't accept bundled better if I had planned it. My whole family are artists or creative sorts. My father is a painter and sculptor and my mother a cobweb artists. My twin sis is also an artist, one of my brothers is a musician and hair stylist and my other brother a collector of wild and endangered animals. I grew up surrounded by art and the artistic insanity that goes with it.
My parents were built-in in New York Metropolis, got married very immature, as and then many did in those days, moved to Dallas, Texas and had four children before they were in their mid-20s. Everything was creative; my father would paint and invent crazy (and not so crazy) things to sell and my mother would weave magical worlds in her wall hangings. She made everything: our dress and our ridiculously good for you meals (gray protein shakes with brewer's yeast and god-knows-what-else inside). She was a ball of energy constantly doing something. Sometimes I would awake in the center of the night to the dissonance of heavy objects being dragged across the floor. Rubbing my tired optics in wonder, I would find my mom rearranging all the furniture in the business firm and polishing the wood floors. When you abound up with information technology you lot don't know information technology's any different from anyone else. But subsequently I would learn that my dwelling house was far different from those of my friends.
Dallas in the tardily 1960s was a pretty conservative place. Bohemian families were certainly non the norm. My twin sis and I would be greeted at schoolhouse dressed in our matching designer handmade outfits to broad eyed wonder. And my young and beautiful mother would come up to PTA meetings dressed in her sexy modernistic dress that would enhance more than than a few eyebrows.
Mostly it was crazy and positive, but sometimes the stress of all those artistic spirits in our home would turn dark. One twenty-four hours I witnessed my male parent called-for all his painting in a fit of rage and frustration. I'll never forget my thoughts at the time. "If beingness an creative person brings this kind of misery and pain, I don't always want to be ane." I vowed at that moment to alive my life on the surface, never to dig by the emotional barrier of my soul. Eventually, the creative pressure level proved too much for my parents too. They broke up when I was nearly 14 and divorced some time after that. From that point on, nosotros all seemed to blow around, apart and together like leaves in a tempest.
My sister and I had been dancing and modeling professionally during our high school years. After graduating, nosotros decided to go to Europe and try our luck there. We had quite a bit of success and a lot of adventure, perhaps more 18 twelvemonth olds were ready for, only life decides what yous can and can't handle. A little older and a lot wiser, we worked our fashion dorsum to Dallas.
The side by side several years were spent doing diverse jobs. It was a night time. My vow of living on the surface was not producing much happiness. I felt lost and rudderless.
Having a twin sis is a blessing that it is hard to draw to those who don't. Sybil understands me in a way I miss in myself sometimes and I do that for her too. Nosotros are unique parts of a greater whole, siblings, friends, confidants, and therapists, oftentimes feeling each other's joy and sorrow. So many times we'll selection up the telephone to tell each other of a certain outcome, and discover the other only had the aforementioned experience. I remember as a child, both of us being taken to the dentist for a checkup and finding the aforementioned cavity (our simply one, ever) in the same place for both of the states. Information technology is no surprise to me we are both artists.
We challenge each other, of course, pointing out each other'due south flaws, competing to see who can do better. I prefer to wait at it as inspiring each other, however. We've taken turns leading each other through the forest of life. By the mid-1980s we had taken some interesting jobs (selling high-stop computer systems, modeling, acting), but I was still unsettled. A Swiss man who had fallen in love with me while we were in Europe came out to Dallas to see me. He begged me to come back to Switzerland and live there. He offered stability, consistency, and prophylactic, those things I thought I needed. I said goodbye to Dallas and my family, not expecting to return.
In Oct of 1986, my middle brother, Peter, had a terrible car accident, driving head-on into a concrete wall. He was thrown through the windshield and into the wall breaking his cervix. Peter is a great looking man and if he had the temperament, could accept been a model. Calling Europe in those days was not like information technology is at present. Y'all did it for birthdays or emergencies. So when I heard my sister'southward voice on the phone, I knew it was bad news earlier she said how-do-you-do. Information technology grew worse from there. What would happen to Peter, would he live, be disfigured, or ever walk again? Nosotros didn't know at the time. I spoke with my boyfriend and his family. These dear people didn't hesitate to tell me that I must be with my family at this time. Only it was my boyfriend who said with a kind of premonition, "If you leave now, you volition never come dorsum." I assured him that was nonsense, of course I would.
Peter was a body builder and wellness fanatic. Though he had a steel halo screwed into his skull to keep his cervix straight, he never gave in to the dire predictions of the doctors. He was not disfigured nor was he destined to exist an invalid. After coming home from the infirmary, he moved in to my apartment and I cared and watched over him as he healed. His recovery was cypher less than miraculous, far exceeding the md's expectations. Bated from tiny scars in his forehead where the stainless-steel screws went into his skull, there are no other lasting marks. Nosotros joked that it was his thick skull that saved him. I mused privately that perhaps it was those horrible vitamin shakes my mom fabricated usa drink.
Several months had passed and Peter was on his own; information technology was time to go dorsum to Switzerland. Simply I couldn't. I saw now that it was not my path. Information technology was not from lack of affection or anything like that, it was simply a nagging pull that it was the wrong direction, that something important was going to happen, just that Europe was not the place. If I went dorsum at that place, I would probably pb a happy, ordinary life, only it was not my destiny and I knew it. I felt my inner vocalization calling, pulling me on. I followed my sis to Los Angeles to find what life had in store for me in that location. At least information technology would exist different.
I have ever felt and heard the placidity vocalisation of what I like to call "my angel." Information technology might be my higher self, intuition, an angel, even God. In the Talmud, it is said that "Every blade of grass has an angel over it whispering, 'grow, grow.'" In Hinduism they phone call it Guru, or ane's higher self, a greater spiritual heed that lives on a higher frequency or aeroplane guiding our growth. Christianity talks nearly angels and our soul, metaphysics most spirit guides and modernistic psychology just calls information technology intuition, a leap of understanding from the subconscious mind. I get out it to each individual to discover their own belief and path. For me, this voice has been my guide, protecting me from danger and guiding me to my life's purpose. But it is simple, when I listen, I always go the right style.
When I was a very young child, peradventure iii or four, my sis and I were exterior playing in our front end yard. It was a warm bound day in Texas, and my mother had left the screen door open then she could hear us. 2 pretty blond twins by themselves playing in a suburban yard. We looked up and saw a black car drive past our firm, slow down, then support into our driveway. I remember it at present, like watching a moving picture in my listen. There was a woman driving, likewise deep in the shadows to run across, and a human sitting in the passenger seat. He opened his door and called to us. "Come on over, I accept a special toy for you to play with. Come up over, it's OK, your mom said yous should make it and see the toy." My sister, Sybil, always the adventurous one, walked up to the open door to run into this mysterious toy. I stood behind the open door looking into the man'due south face. I'll never forget his eyes, cold and dead, and he had a dark mole on his temple. My inner phonation was now screaming at me "Evil. Stay away!" Merely at that age you are taught to listen to adults, trust their say-so and I stood frozen in place. "Come in and y'all can have the toy." The woman urged. Sybil edged closer, barely a hand's grasp from this strange homo, and then curious virtually this special toy.
"Dejeuner fourth dimension! Time to come in girls." My mother called from inside our home, oblivious to the night drama unfolding in the driveway.
Sybil had been leaning into the open door, reaching for the toy. When she heard my mom's voice, she leaped back and said, "We accept to eat lunch now. But yous can join us." She brightened. "Come have tiffin with us. I'll tell my mommy." They mumbled something, but didn't follow.
Once within I told my mother virtually the strangers and the offer of a toy. Sybil asked if they could join u.s. for lunch. My mom'due south optics went wide and she bolted from the house. The car had been facing outward for a quick escape and was already halfway down the block when we reached the street. We saw information technology turn the corner and disappear. I notwithstanding shudder to think how my life could take changed that day if my mother hadn't called when she did.
Once in Los Angeles, I found life not so different from Dallas, jobs, nighttime-life, hangovers. The call for pregnant scratched at my airtight door. Once more it was a homo who pulled me away, promising security and ease. He was from New York Urban center and was visiting Los Angeles. My sis wasn't pleased. "How can you exist interested in this guy?" "I don't know," I said, "only I feel that he's going to accept me to the identify I'm supposed to exist." Looking dorsum, I realize how prophetic that was.
It all seems so quick, in hindsight. I was only in my mid-twenties. But at the fourth dimension it seemed like a lifetime. I won't go into all the gory details, but give yous just plenty to know how I concluded upwards in Aspen. We got married and I moved to New York, where I was desperately unhappy, simply put on a brave front. This was the man who was to atomic number 82 me to my destiny, so why didn't it feel right? I made the most of my time in New York. I of my husband's acquaintances, a woman close to my mother's age, became a close friend. Her daughter had died of cancer every bit a teenager. My friend dedicated her life to finding a cure to childhood leukemia through cancer research and handling. One of her goals was to heighten plenty money to add together a special pediatric unit onto a prominent infirmary in New York Metropolis. I helped with her fund raising efforts and am proud to have been a role of something and then important. The pediatric cancer center, dedicated to her daughter'south memory, was congenital in 2006 and helps many children to this day.
In the first summertime of our matrimony, my husband suggested we go to Aspen, Colorado for a holiday. I initially refused, not wanting to exist around all the glitz and glamour I imagined there. He had family in Colorado, and so he insisted, and we went. Of course, one time there, I fell in love with the identify, the mountains, the air. I felt in my heart I was finally habitation. After all these years of traveling and searching, I knew this was where I was supposed to exist, where I was to notice my purpose. I cried most of the style on the flight dorsum to New York. "I can't heighten a family and live in New York." I had tasted my destiny and saw where I was supposed to live.
In 1991 we moved to Snowmass Hamlet (the ski boondocks just outside of Aspen). I was but 26 years old, but it felt equally if my life had been very long and complicated up to that betoken. I began to feel the thin air of the mountains carrying me frontwards. I won't go into all the reasons I shouldn't have been married to my first husband. I volition just say simply that information technology was a very poor fit, we were too different. He institute my spiritual leanings foolish and had no interest in art or civilization. I went out to observe work then I would accept some autonomy and my own money. That's when everything changed.
My friend (the one who built the cancer center) and her married man were visiting u.s.a. from New York. I told her that I wanted to work in an art gallery, to be effectually art. She was kind, but discouraged me heartily, "You have no experience, no fine art degree, not even a basic college degree, what can you offering?" She suggested I work at what I knew. I had done well selling high-cease wear in Los Angeles, there was plenty of that in Aspen. I know she was trying to be helpful, non see me become rejected, but her words burned in me like a challenge rather than motherly communication. During my walks around Aspen, I enjoyed window shopping. Every time I passed the Magidson Fine Fine art Gallery, I felt a strong pull.
Now things got interesting in my life, well, more interesting. It was a beautiful January afternoon, in 1992, clear and common cold. The sky was cobalt blue, a colour you see almost every day in the Rocky Mountains but never have for granted. I walked into the Magidson Art Gallery to pick up an awarding, make an appointment or just see if there was a position available. Jay Magidson, the possessor, was there in the back of the gallery. He stood up, walked upwardly to me and said, "Y'all've come for a job interview." Information technology wasn't a question.
The previous salesperson had left in December. Jay had been running the gallery by himself since that time. He knew he needed to become help, merely had hesitated to put an advertizement in the newspaper, "That's not how you get practiced employees," he mused, "the right one volition come on his or her own."
Jay and I sat down and talked about the job, about art, almost a 1000000 things. I was supposed to take my friend and her hubby to the airport that afternoon but stayed in the gallery, barely getting them there in fourth dimension later. We had talked for about two hours. By the end of the interview, he offered me the job. Jay told me years later that he had fallen in love with me as soon as I walked in, had heard a voice in his head say, "That is the woman you lot should exist with, should marry."
I started working equally a salesperson for the Magidson Fine Art Gallery. It was a terrific job. The gallery was full of wonderful modern and contemporary masters and a handful of innovative emerging artists. Jay is a natural teacher and led me through any I didn't know, never embarrassing me. "Anyone can learn art history," he said, "only yous are built-in knowing how to engage people, that'southward why I hired yous." It didn't take long earlier I was selling art like a seasoned pro. I loved working in that location and getting away from my unpleasant home-life.
Jay and I became great friends, sharing everything, sometimes talking an hour or ii after closing. It was so piece of cake, so natural. Don't become me wrong, information technology was never inappropriate. Jay knew I was married and never crossed that line. He had concluded his ain matrimony years before and would never interfere in mine. Besides, I put on a great show of telling everyone how happily married I was. Jay had no reason to remember in that location would ever be annihilation more than friendship. Information technology was an odd time for me, split between these two worlds; on 1 side an unhappy marriage and on the other, art, friendship and a growing dearest for Jay. My heart was telling me that this was the human being I was supposed to exist married to.
When I was very small-scale I had a premonition almost my life. I knew I would ally and work with my best friend and we would have 2 children, a boy and a girl. It was such a simple and childish vision that I put it aside, though never forgetting it. During that first year of wedlock, I would wait sideways at my first married man and ask God, "Y'all told me I would work with my husband who would be my best friend. Why is information technology so hard to work and exist with this man? This tin can't be right."
About a year and one-half went by in this way and finally, my spousal relationship was washed; I called an chaser and moved into my own flat. In the winter of 1994, an fine art dealer friend of Jay'south was visiting Aspen from Belgium. We took him out to dinner and subsequently went to a nightclub for cocktails and dancing. We all had a few drinks in us. Exterior the club, without thinking, I grabbed Jay and kissed him, "put my tongue downwards his throat," he likes to say. That's all you get to hear about that, but needless to say, it was the get-go of a love thing that is 20 years quondam and counting.
Jay and I got married in June, 1996.
I continued to work with him at the gallery in Aspen, becoming his partner in virtually ways. In that location are so many parts to running an art gallery, exciting and different from any other business. One unique attribute is working with artists. Jay is naturally good at this, he says it is because he studied to be an artist as a youth. Peradventure, but I recollect it takes something more, an honest curiosity and honey nearly art. This was something we shared securely. I of the artists, Eva Cellini, connected with Jay and me in a deep and lasting mode. I was drawn – no, that's not the right word – inspired by her work.
Eva was in her late 60s when I met her and I was in my tardily 20s. The age departure meant nix to either of united states; we became corking friends, sometimes speaking for hours on the phone. She probably won't admit information technology, merely she is a philosopher and has taught me so much nigh life and art. During the years in the gallery, I sold dozens of her paintings, in dear with each one. Sometimes regretting seeing them go, always happy for the collector who got to own them. I take several of her works in our home and am still inspired by them every twenty-four hour period.
During the many times I visited Eva in New Jersey, I learned most the life of an creative person. It was magical to me, intriguing and inspiring. I saw how she organized her home, her time and her life effectually her art. She did not paint at all hours of the dark, wear ridiculous outfits or exercise any of the clichéd things that artists are reported to do. She was disciplined, focused and dedicated to her craft. Much subsequently, when I was an creative person myself, she told me, "An artist doesn't always have to be painting to exist working. The procedure goes on all the time. Yous are thinking about it, dreaming about it, working out problems and challenges when you are going through your day, cooking, cleaning or sleeping. You are always working." It was this communication that helped me realize that I had ever been an artist, far before I had picked upward my start brush.
Eva is now 88 and still inspires me equally an artist, every bit a person. Her health has slowed her down, but notwithstanding she goes to her studio and paints about every day. Side by side to Jay, she is my best friend and mentor. I don't know if I would have made the leap to become an creative person without her inspiration. I know information technology would have been much harder. I love you Eva.
Through the 1990s and into the early 2000s, Jay and I worked adjacent in the gallery, making a wonderful life for ourselves. In 1998, I brought my first affections into the globe, my daughter, Isabella. But I call up I saw her long before that. Earlier I was pregnant, I woke to the vision of a young girl lying beside me in bed. She was turned away from me, her long night hair laying on the pillow beside me. Her hair and chiffon blouse billowed as if by a soft breeze. I felt and so much peace and love. When I realized that I was awake and looking at an apparition, it disturbed the moment and the affections swirled away. Dream, vision, whatever you want to call information technology, I am convinced it was Isabella's spirit coming to me before she was born. She is a souvenir. In October, 2000, we had our 2nd angel, a boy, Teagan. He is a ball of energy and wisdom, curious and live. I am grateful for my children, how they have enriched my life and anchored me to this world. Any parent volition share with you the challenges raising children, but they will besides share with you the immense love that they bring to your life.
Existence an creative person and mother is a unique challenge. There volition always exist bumps in the road, unexpected distraction and daily interruptions; however I am reminded every mean solar day that I have been given a souvenir, that fine art and maternity are my purpose and responsibility. It is my obligation to give it dorsum. Just mostly I desire to be an inspiration for my family.
I didn't come to exist an artist hands, though it was e'er there. I resisted it terribly, unhappily going a dissimilar management. Information technology is easy to say that at present, looking back, but looking forward in those years, I simply saw unchanging sameness. It would accept the feet of middle historic period to intermission through my carefully crafted walls. Simply break through I did and now I look frontward, not at sameness, but at unending inventiveness and dazzler. I wish this for every person alive – find what you love and do it.
One often meets his desiny on the road he takes to avoid information technology.
– Jean de La Fontaine
We returned from New York City a few days ago. Our hearts become out to all the people of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut who are nonetheless dealing with the backwash of Hurricane Sandy. For the most part Manhattan looked pretty good (excluding some of the southern part). New Yorkers are a hearty bunch and they got things up and running very quickly. We visited our dear friend Eva Cellini in New Jersey and that was another story. Trees and light poles littered the streets. The harm took ane'southward breath away. It is plainly much amend now, but we certainly offering those nonetheless suffering our thoughts and prayers.
Sabbatum, November 10th the Hermitage Museum Foundation threw its almanac gala to support the Hermitage Museum and specifically the "Fine art From America" programme. Jeff Koons and Erik Bulatov were this year's honorees. Both spoke eloquently well-nigh their art and inspirations. Two smashing artists from different cultures, with more in common as artists than not. Truly inspiring.
After the dinner and speakers the auction began. OK, I'll acknowledge it at present, Ingrid and I were nervous. Her piece was the first to be auctioned off. Nosotros held our breaths equally the bidding began. This was an $xviii,000 piece and the bidding began at $ii,000. Information technology bounced around, $4,000, $six,000, so stalled at $8,000. OK, somebody's going to become a great bargain, we idea. Then a collector jumped in at $x,000 and the behest stopped. The auctioneer was about to slam the hammer down when… I'yard non going to tell y'all. You are going to accept to see for yourself. I posted the video of the auction on YouTube. Forgive the poor quality, it was taken using my iPhone.
Hermitage Museum Gala Auction Video – Nov 10, 2012
The video only shows the auctioning of Ingrid'south piece. The residuum of the evening was terrific and I've heard report that they raised quite a fleck of money from the sale of works by Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, Michal Rovner and Martin Mull. It is also gratifying to know that a portion of the money raised volition go to assist relief efforts for hurricane victims – squeamish touch.
Ingrid and I would similar to thank the many people who put on this elegant and important event: the generous board members of the Hermitage Museum Foundation, specially Paul and Chauncie Rodzianko and their girl Marina, Mark Kelner. Thank y'all staff and assembly of the Hermitage Museum Foundation, peculiarly Annie. Thanks Phillips de Pury Auctioneers for the cute setting surrounded by great contemporary fine art. And thanks Simon de Pury for your auction wizardry. A very special thanks goes to Brad and Penny Identify, our dearest friends and patrons who helped brand the evening possible for us.
Wow what a nighttime, we're still flying!
Source: https://blog.ingridmagidson.com/category/jay-magidson/
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