Exerpt from the Review of the Mary E.Rawlyk Ehibition

by Kathy Brown

ATLANTIS 1986
at Mount St. Vincent University Art Gallery, Halifav, NS

Mary Rawlyk:  The Domestic Experience

This is a feminist exhibition. Mary Rawlyk has struggled for years to find time to make art. Her family life is busy and complex. She is often angered by the juggling act she must engage in, and by the invisibility of much of the domestic work she performs. While the house runs smoothly, no one notices the housewife’s effort. Though Rawlyk has over time been able to extricate herself often enough to gain training and to produce a body of work, the frustration remains. And she realizes that many women are in a far worse position.

Since the work in this exhibition erupted out of anger, one expects to see wild Expressionistic prints. Not so. As Rawlyk writes in beginning her catalogue essay,” For as long as I can remember I have enjoyed colour and light and form, and have found pleasure in line and texture and spatial arrangement.”

It is out of these and out of the domestic objects she sees every day that she makes her statement. Her images are carefully thought out, their strength arising not from wildly expressive abandon but from intelligent execution.

Earlier from 1972 to 1978 when making art was particularly difficult, she had turned to depicting domestic objects in her prints. These early works, the Domestic Object Series had a formalist approach to the subject. They did not express much of Rawlyk’s feeling about her situation. Then, through reading, she discovered that she was not the only housewife to feel dissatisfied and frustrated, and that other artists, especially in the U.S. were using the domestic experience as subject matter. By 1980 she was ready to make prints directly related to her experience as an artist/housewife- housewife/artist.

Her first efforts, begun in 1981 are included in this exhibition. The Housewife Series mates colour xerox transfer prints of Rawlyk’s face with images of common domestic objects produced by various intaglio printing processes. Egg woman watches helplessly while the eggs (chicks) leave the box(nest). If the box closes she’ll be crushed. Cake Rack Woman is obviously in jail. Measuring Cup Woman reflects on her fate. Rawlyk used her own face because she did not feel that another woman would want to be depicted this way. Indeed, these images are almost repellant in their anger. Woman is entrapped by her domestic role, there is hope. The most moving image in this series is Canadian Apron Flag, the Canadian Flag centred by a red apron rather than a maple leaf.

This image was born after Margaret Mitchell was ridiculed in the Commons for bringing up the issue of wife battering and produced during the uproar over the inclusion of women’s rights in the Constitution. This was an especially discouraging time for Canadian women, and the Housewife Series reflects this.

While producing this series Rawlyk was searching for a symbol which would symbolize womens’ housework more universally. The domestic objects and the self-portrait aspect of the Housewife Series were too closely linked to the artist herself. By process of elimination, she chose aprons, the ordinary non-bib kind which tie around the waist. The Apron Series is her most successful statement. These prints work on many levels. They are finely designed and executed images and they are replete with feeling.

The prints in the Apron Series are admirable for their invention. Rawlyk carefully arranges the apron on an inked plate and runs it through the press. She then lays her print making paper on the resulting ink image and reruns the plate to make her apron print. The print shows the weave, the crumples, the folds, the sewing and embroidery details of the original apron. Rawlyk adds to the image with hand colouring and sometimes, further printing. The black background is achieved through a stencil print. These are monoprints essentially, though small runs of three to six almost identical images are possible. In this case Rawlyk terms the set of prints “variations” rather than an edition.

All this attention and care is lavished not to produce an intriguing image, but to make a statement. The hands appended to some of the ties are a key element. They humanize the image. These are not just aprons, they are symbols for every woman who has sunk into a chair exhausted at the end of a domestic day. Angry Red Apron, Blue headache Apron, Hanging Green Apron and their companions express the problems of domesticity in a poignant manner, with which viewers, both female and male, identify. Most of these images need no titles or interpretation. The message is clear. We are all forced to examine our own attitudes and feelings about this absolutely necessary, yet still undervalued aspect of daily life.

Pink Proposal Apron expresses the essence of the female dilema. Two cross-stitched figures, male and female, seem to symbolize the marriage proposal with its romance and promise.The apron itself symbolizes the domestic role attendant to the acceptance of marriage and the possibility of a family, a role which nearly always falls on the woman. It’s the unusual woman who recognizes this feature of the situation. The apron seems to say “I didn’t know what I was getting into!”

The aprons are printed in soft colours. In themselves they are gentle images. The black background gives them punch and carrying power. Without it they would retreat into the white walls of the gallery,  It is the background which delineates the apron ties and the hands which so often make the statement.

Women’s contribution to the common good through domestic labour remains largely unrecognized. Rawlyk pushes for redress. These prints, individually and en masse, are a powerful statement. They communicate their message visually. They don’t need verbal explanation (…) In many respects, this is an important exhibition. It expresses the feelings of a very large proportion of Canada’s population in a way that can be understood by many and with a force and directness difficult to reach in methods less immediate than the visual.