Review of Exhibition, Mary  Rawlyk

by Terry Reilander
Kingston Whig-Standard 1974
at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON

One woman exhibit for printmaker, homemaker

Like many housewives, Mary Rawlyk spends a great deal of time doing housework. With two little school-aged girls and a husband who teaches history at Queen’s University, she has her work cut out for her. But unlike many housewives, Mrs. Rawlyk blends her chores at home with a very demanding career as an artist. She is a printmaker whose first one man exhibition will open at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre this Saturday.

For her subjects, Mrs Rawlyk has chosen objects familiar to every person who will view the exhibition. The titles of her prints are comfortably familiar even for first time gallery visitors:  ironing, raking leaves, magnet attracting nails, sawing wood, cutting string, laundry, combing and rain clearing, which features a beautifully blended rainbow effect.

Mrs. Rawlyk explained in an interview that this series of prints is the beginning of a stream of visual ideas she is simply putting on paper. It started with the print “Combing,”and the prints which followed retained a similar format using the graphic properties of familiar objects.

The prints, each precise in its detail ( although Mrs Rawlyk has made as many as 40 copies of them,) depict objects and their functions in a disarmingly simple way.

The artist explains that in addition to the obvious statement about object and function found in each print, some of them are also about the procedures of print making. This is a process “as ancient and simple as making footprints,”she explains. For example the scissors, comb, saw blade, and wood block were all inked to produce their own images. Mrs Rawlyk said that the objects were all chosen partly for their meaning and relevance to the experience of many people. Certainly they are personal too, she explains as they are part of her environment which is very domestic.

And here’s where a system of priorities comes in. Print making is a dirty exacting job, requiring hours of patient labour and intense concentration. As she does not own an etching press, which is expensive and hard to come by, Mrs Rawlyk has to travel across town to use a press which is heavily booked. So she wants to do as much as possible each time she uses it. But finished or not, she packs up her equipment each day and is home in time to welcome Miriam and Anna home from school.

“I spend most of my time on family things” she says, explaining that she doesn’t want her busy life as an artist to interfere with her close family life. She supervises her children’s activities and makes sure that the family has a balanced social life. And she does all the little things a mother has to do. “If the children suddenly need sneakers, we go to get them. My family has priority over printing any day,”she says. I’m a three meals a day mum, she laughed, adding that as soon as she is able, she will buy an etching press.

(This is an exerpt from a longer article.)