Twenty plus years ago, my partner Judith and I lived in Montauk, New York, where she owned a down and dirty rock and roll bar called the Memory Motel. The Memory hosted many professional recording and touring musicians looking for a little beach down time. The most common comment from the mix of local and tourist patrons was “these guys are much too good to be playing this joint.”
Fast-forward 15 years. I first met Michael Monarch when he played at a fund- raiser for a fellow musician with a serious medical problem. That encounter triggered that old delightful recognition of a world- class artist in an unexpected venue. As I got to know him I found out Michael was the original lead guitarist for Steppenwolf, a contributor on Janis Joplin’s “Kosmic Blues” album, and for the last 20 years toured with the star studded band, The World Classic Rockers.
More recently I discovered Michael’s digital artwork. I alerted my sister Jamie, the publisher of Fine Art Magazine, to my find. She was impressed enough to want to do a feature article on him. I will conclude these liner notes with my first reaction to Michael’s art, be it audio or visual. From a musical perspective, every guitar riff, every power chord is played with a go-for-broke, pedal-to-the-metal urgency. I had the same response to his digital work. Conformism and caution are not part of his repertoire, but I’ll let you draw your own conclusions from the featured graphics. Climb aboard for this kaleidoscopic Magic Carpet Ride.
RICHARD SCHALLER
When did you become interested in art?
Everyone in my family dabbled in art. My brother, dad and uncle all painted. At a young age I did some painting and sculpting. Early on I was fascinated with the special effects and the art that went into the Disney movies and theme parks. Growing up in California I think I was taken to Disneyland the first year it was opened in 1955. I went regularly for many years. I even had dreams of working for Disney in the art or sculpting department but when my music career started to take off … well that became my focus. As I got older my taste in art became more defined. I was really drawn toward printmaking, especially etchings with shade and color (aquatint, mezzo tint, mixed media, etc). Generally I have been more interested in abstract than realism.
Other than music are there other art forms you express yourself in?
I did some competition swing dancing years ago and even won a few titles in California. West Coast Swing is the state dance. Another interest of mine is motorcycles and I have done some custom designing of a few bikes.
Which artists if any influenced you?
Well I can give you a partial list of well known artists that I’m interested in: Miro, Pollock, Kandinsky, Picasso, Rene Carcan, Renee Lubarow and Klee.
How long have you been creating your serious abstracts?
For about the last ten years I have been creating the particular type of abstract prints seen here.
What elements of sound or musical expression do you call upon as an emotional or intellectual influence if any?
I love modern art – Expressionism, Cubism, abstract. The raw emotion in these forms plus the interaction with the viewer is very appealing to me.
In music I love jazz and fusion (a mix of jazz, blues, rock, etc.) which definitely ties in with my artistic tastes. Music and art are so alike … expressing with sound or with a visual medium … it’s really the same thing to me. Angular lines, smooth curves, splashes and crashes of sound or color; creating moods and feelings; saying something. To me, music is art, art is music.
Your palette used through your digital medium is clear and clean. Is this by design?
I would say yes. I think part of being an artist is to know what you like … what you’re after. Much of what I do is experimental but there is a guiding force that leads me to final composition and effect. I don’t really know why I’m so drawn to the etched look in printmaking. I love the detail but also there is a gritty, metallic earthiness that happens in the etching process that intrigues me and pulls me in. I also love the inkiness of the colors of that type of art.
There is a part of me that loves detail … but also a part that relates to big explosive free form expression … especially in colors. Another aspect is the unexpected things that happen in the mechanical process of printmaking. The acid eating at the metal and the artifacts that this leaves on the paper. All of this attracts and influences me and I think is visible in my work with the use of a digital medium.
What story are the works telling?
I consider my work abstract and free form not really trying to depict a thing but rather a feeling – really raw and emotional – with the process being an important part of the end product. The titles really come afterward as a possible description of the outcome and to help me recall and talk about a particular piece.
The works appear to roll out of a differing spatial experience. “Experiment” looks like a Praying Mantis to me. Is there an underlying vision you’re expressing in this one? Do you see the complete expression in your mind as a statement (like a vision) for a work prior to creating the piece? Or do you form a compositional statement extrapolated from experiences you translate into color and form?
The way I would describe my process of creating is playful experimentation; letting things happen and subconsciously releasing memories, feelings and experiences. Really, I’m just playing.
Michael Monarch n Legendary Guitarist, Visionary Artist
By JAMIE ELLIN FORBES
Michael Monarch’s work offers a pathway toward fluid movement, connecting a remembrance of rhythmic forms floating under light with color composed stating the artist’s creative intent. A new pallet of digitally organized tools, realize Monarch’s works technically outside the scope and capacity of the traditional medium to achieve his distinctive contemporary art style. The grid of the universe displayed in splashes and layers composed a freshly formed vision of impression within a digital art pallet which keystone Monarchs images.
Works created by the new media permit a change in curve or line with contemplated exact precision offering a perceptual difference for the viewer. Senses are challenged to synthesize hearing in addition to seeing color and form when combine as composition. The artist’s abstracted impressions convey a remote story emerging from the far reaches of a universal minds-eye to deliver a non-linear visual experience as compositional works executed in the new medium of digital painting.
Achieved via Monarch’s inflection of beat is his invitation to enter the free-form world of experimentation within digital medium. The expertise to paint digitally requires mastery of expression within the mechanics of the computer in combination with artistic imagination. Eluding or impressing line joining form within the works previously unknown in traditional media invite one into a spatially contingent experience observed as the work takes part in the now. As a feeling, Monarch’s perception of his creative idea can be absorbed as beads of water impacting or taking formation – spilling out. He is arranging the colored swirls and droplets against a background newly imagined as possible; always there and present simultaneously anew within each artwork.
With spontaneity, Jackson Pollock splashed his paint, like watercolor hitting the canvas without order. When taken a step further, color is set free digitally. The impact or burst of energy injected is perceived very differently, for example, in “Abstract.” A path to the surreal without form suggested in “Experiment” reveals a subconscious origin of an idea awaiting communication, all the while maintaining a distinct ebb and flow woven within the color to create a semblance of a patterned idea, which the artist has directed compositionally. Monarch takes the viewer for a walk into the hinterlands of a universal landscape to deliver within the context of his work a mood and visuality reminiscent of Matta, Keel, Kandinsky, Miro, Picasso and the masterful 20th century Abstract Expressionists. Their influences newly imagined though the computer offers an infinite opportunity.
Within the context of the Abstract Expressionists’ explosions of color filaments drifting like illuminated dancing forms moving through space with a destination in mind. Although random in the dispersion, there is an exactness to work driving to identify with Monarch’s intent. The energy force and color combined in “Eruption of Color” is not chaotic, though complex and sometimes very busy combinations of color and rhythm resonate within the plain of view cohesively. The dynamic movement captured in “Explosion,” and “Eruption of Color ” is pure Monarch. He melds line, color and objects seamlessly in digital compositions as an overall aesthetic. One associates the art statement as uplifting in feeling.
Michael Monarch brings his musical expertise to recognize and achieve his internal autonomous artistic statement with a developed awareness of style, form and function. Plus, he was a superstar in a revolutionary band (Steppenwolf), an accomplishment he achieved as in his art – with balance, great composition and a confidence enhanced by personal skill and plenty of practice. As free-formed as the works are, a disciplined execution of compositional abstract experience are evident in his visionary images. Digital art is a new medium in use by artists experimenting without limits employing the rich texture of color and compositional theory in a context waiting to be uniquely realized. Monarch maximizes his discoveries as opportunity to be found within his experimentations as curious, playful, diverse and just fun to view and explore – a world, familiar and unique – shared with his audience.