MERRYWRATH
photography and then some: the works of Mary Rath
about
On May 18, 1980 Joy Division front man Ian Curtis died. A few days later I was conceived and was born the following year in time for the release of the Siouxsie and the Banshees album Juju.
I was the third child my parents had, and they named me Mary Catherine because they finally remembered they were Catholic.
My formative years consisted of my parents and older sisters taping programs from PBS. As a result I got to watch "Mystery!" when it was still hosted by Vincent Price, and see Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes. The openning credits based on the illustrations of Edward Gorey made an impression on me, and I can remember trying my hand at drawing the skull seen on the tombstone.
There was a brief time when I enjoyed saying the word "graveyard."
I was a shy, quite child who always lived inside my own head. When a subject in class didn't interest me I'd spend my time drawing in my notebook or making up stories. At the time I did not realize these moments where when the muses were trying to talk to me.
When I was a little girl I loved lions and wanted one for a pet. The first time I visited the Art Institute of Chicago I remember being excited because there were statues of lions on the front steps. That is when I decided I wanted to persue the arts. The idea that you can create something which people will go out of their way to admire sounded interesting to me.
My paternal grandfather was an amateur photographer for many years, but by the time I was born he had already moved on to wood work. However I believe through genetics that I inherited a love of photography from him.
Much to the disapointment of my high school classmates who were already boring and lacked any imagination I entered Saint Mary's College to study art and graduated with a BFA in 2003. It was there I learned two lessons: I definitely prefered photography over painting, and I was very good at making people feel uneasy with my work.
Ever since the muses have had me experiment with a few media including lipstick, illustration, and my first love: photography.
After discovering the German industrial band Einstürzende Neubauten I experimented with "scratch art", named so because early on I scratched the surface of a photograph with a razor, which quickly evolved to include bleach, fire, and water colors to create a new piece by destroying it.
In the summer of 2004 I had a fever which caused me to fall into a delirious state. As I was bedridden for a week all I could do was sleep and listen to music. I played my sister’s copy of The Scream by Siouxsie and the Banshees and as the song “Suburban Relapse” played I imagined blurred, black and white images of the suburban neighborhood I had lived in all of my life.
When I recovered I began my Suburban Nightmare series, in which I would walk around my town in the evening and photograph the familiar houses and streets while purposely shaking the camera to blur the image. As these were photographed on film I had to always tell the developer at the drug store to print all images because the blur was done on purpose.
Now the muses present me with ideas at pace which my mortal body cannot sustain. They often forget humans can tire easily and ideas can fade. Also, humans have lives which are more complex than muses, and day to day events in the life of a human often interfere with creation. Yet they continue to give me items and subjects which they want me to use.
If I could talk fluently with the muses I would, but speaking the language of Muse is a life time learning process.