Blending their artistic abilities

Suzie Harrison

Their work is like poetry, poetry on canvas where paint and sculpture

replace the words, and a story unfolds before one’s eyes without ever

having to turn the page. It’s a story to be read over and over, the

kind that is hard to put down, get out of the mind, one that becomes

a part of oneself, as one becomes part of it.

That’s what happens when experiencing Myrella Moses and Eric

Mondriaan’s work. Its message and images hold onto to the attention

of the viewer and never let go.

For 12 years, these Newport Beach artists have been working as a

team, creating work that has captured the attention of many. They

have gained the attention of Tyler Stallings, curator for Laguna Art

Museum’s exhibits, who having experienced their art before, asked

them to be the only Orange County artists to exhibit in the wildly

popular “Whiteness, A Wayward Construction.” “Whiteness” is a group

exhibition of 78 artworks that explore the identity, politics and

culture of whiteness in the United States.

“I was doing a show at Saddleback in the fall at Saddleback

College and Tyler saw them and wanted to use them in this exhibit,”

Moses said. “I’ve been working mainly on white sculpture for the last

10 to 15 years.”

Moses, who has being doing artwork for a long time, started her

white series in 1985. Her solo piece at the Laguna exhibit is called

“In the Mean Time,” and she explained the piece as having a double

entendre.

“There’s a gun under a pillow and an African headrest with a knife

underneath it,” Moses said. “You can sit on it or sleep. Underneath

the headrest I used sand from where Mandela stood in Palina, South

Africa.”

The “Whiteness” exhibit is the first time that Moses and Mondriaan

have shown their work together.

“It’s doubly big to have this body of work that we did together

and to have it validated in the museum show is huge,” Moses said.

Their piece “Wishing Well” is also a mixed-media piece. The

sculpture has imprints in the white part, impressions of someone

having lain on his stomach while using his finger to play with the

water, a painted water vortex that whirls from its blue surface to

the blackness inside to the unknown.

“You can see the water going up and then flattening out,”

Mondriaan said. “It means be careful what you wish for, because it

might suck you under, or suck you in.”

Because people dream, they said, it’s more effective to have the

distortions in the painting. It gives it a quality beyond reality,

luminous of the dream.

“The painted part is thought, dreams and emotions visualized,”

Mondriaan said. “The white is reality. It’s tactile, you can touch

the bed and pillow -- it’s reality.”

Seeing Moses and Mondriaan together, it’s easy to see their

synergy and why they work so well as a team.

“When I first met Eric, I wanted to sculpt him and have a large

piece created,” Moses said. “That’s when I discovered his talents for

drawing and painting, and we have been working together ever since.

He was able to do so many things I couldn’t do, so it was a perfect

combination.”

Mondriaan said that he came in to support her art and did a lot of

things such as designs and sketches.

Their work is complementary, each telling a story through the

fusion of their art, a process they work on until they are both

completely satisfied, giving nothing less than their best.

“Meeting Eric was like meeting my long lost twin,” Moses said. “We

would have totally been childhood friends. We play well together. The

night we met, we stayed up until 7 a.m. talking at Denny’s while he

painted with the sugar. I knew we had to work together. My life

changed overnight. I had an instant partner.”

Visiting their home and studio on the Back Bay is something one

might be able to conjure in a dream or see in a movie. Perhaps that’s

because Moses worked as a set designer and has put together the

perfect scene for the two of them. There are intricate fabrics, beds

placed inside and outside on different levels of the home and it’s

surrounded in a jungle of plants and perfectly placed art.

They have the luxury of working when they are most inspired,

which, they say, is mostly at night until about 3 a.m. “I’ll come up

with the ideas and present them to him,” Moses said. “He’ll edit and

then we’ll debate about what the piece is supposed to say. We’ll

whittle it down until it reads in one harmonious note.”

There are times when they have worked on a piece and it is done

except for the final stroke -- and since Mondriaan finishes the

piece, if that last stroke isn’t right, he’ll start from scratch to

make sure it’s perfect.

“We have to be able to be totally honest,” Moses said. “It’s not

right until it’s right for both of us.”

Mondriaan and Moses are working on a new series, as well as

working on some commissioned pieces. To find out more about their

work, and where you can see their art, call their studio at (949)

759-3492 or e-mail [email protected].