Monika Meler interview May 2025

Can you tell us about the history of your personal exposure to art?  How did you first become interested? Did any artists or works inspire you to pursue becoming an artist? 

Growing up, I did not have much exposure to art culture, what we may consider the “art world.” However, my father was incredibly creative and seeing him care for creative things was paramount. He taught me that creativity was a form of care, of self-care, care for those around
you and for the world. He was a gardener (horticulturist by trade), made sculptures in his garden, and drew often. I did not go to my first art museum until I was a junior in High School, and I decided to become an artist way before this. 

My first exposure to art was through libraries and bookstores more than anything else. In 8th grade, I picked up a Kandinsky book in an art
section of a bookstore. I only picked up Kandinsky because his name sounded Eastern European. I became an artist because of him. It wasn’t an instant decision; I checked out many Kandinsky books. They led to other art books, many of which led to fashion design books. I responded to vivid images in books, of lives that I did not inhabit. The weirder the better, the more it countered this suburban mundane that I was in. I just couldn’t believe the way images made me feel. Colorful, active, alive. In High School, I read Concerning the Spiritual in Art by Kandinsky. I don’t remember what it said, but I indulged in every word. I’ve tried to read it multiple times since and find it dry and boring (sorry Kandinsky) but reading it in High School meant so much to me.

Concerning the Spiritual in Art is still an example of what I value in art. The analysis, the freedom to think creatively and differently, and the constant back and forth between innovation and tradition. I have always been interested in Art History, I minored in it in college, and it is still a driving force, giving me ideas to either push against or into. When I discovered printmaking in my first year of B.F.A studies at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, it was instinctive. As an immigrant from Poland to Chicago, my family and I worked in labor-intensive jobs, like many other immigrants. The first time I made a lithograph; the process was not unlike degreasing the floor of the service area at the Saturn car dealership my parents and I cleaned to pay for school. Machinery, chemicals, and process-intensive work were familiar. When cleaning sinks at Saturn, I often made drawings using my finger in the cleaning solution. Printmaking recalled these vivid experiences.

As your practice developed over time, what were your motivations? What keeps you making art?

Art school rooted me in observation, a skill that takes a long time to build, requires meditative focus, and has led me as an artist, teacher, and mother. If you look long enough, you will discover everything. My abstraction is always rooted in observation. I start with a real thing, I look for a long time, I break it apart.

Even though Kandinsky was the catalyst for so much of what I do, becoming a primarily abstract artist was a gradual accident. Starting out as a figurative artist, immediately recognizable images disappeared from my work very slowly early on in my career. I began questioning how to evoke something rather than tell it. The Kandinsky influence still checks out in terms of my interest in color. It’s not that I like color (I do), but it’s more about what story color must tell us. In my series of prints Mountains Beyond Mountains, I explored blue as Rebecca Solnit wrote about it in A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Blue as a story, as the color of distance, as a metaphor for what we desire makes me more excited about blue. Blue, the message our planet sends to the Universe. Blue is the most liked color on the planet and that presents an interesting thing to push against: Can I make this blue uncomfortable for you?

What does your current creative process look like? What activities make up your studio practice? 

I draw a lot, I think a whole bunch, and I read all the time. More than telling stories that connect to the literary works I read, I am interested in some of the ways that my favorite writers tell stories. Olga Tokarczuk is an author I admire a lot. Her book Flights creates a deep non-linear narrative.

I turned to papercuts because having children made it difficult to be at the press as much as I wanted. I started to cut old prints apart to make new ones. I still print, and now that my children are more independent, I have enjoyed returning to the printed image more. But the papercut has become a language that I am equally invested in. I return to old work all the time and cut it apart. It becomes its’ own non-linear narrative. I collage a lot. It is an under-rated art form, the collage.

What subjects or ideas run through your current work? What about your personal narrative connects you to your current materials and body of work?

The constant re-using speaks to sustainability. Paper, the medium I connect to most, is incredibly water intensive to produce. I want to use every bit of it. All paper; not just fine art paper is underrated. People once fought wars over paper! Paper is a chameleon; it can become almost anything. Currently, I am working on more color possibilities. My next series will explore brown. I’m still in the starting stages of the brown series, so I am sketching a lot, taking walks and photographing brown things, and making lists of words that brown conjures.

What historical or contemporary artists are you in conversation with? Are there any art movements or theories that influence your way of thinking about your work? Who have you been looking at lately, reading or listening to?

The Russian avant-garde is a period I come back to over and over. It’s playful. It’s also absurd and speaks to this idea of hope, freedom, and change. I have been in an involuntary conversation with Vladimir Tatlin for 20+ years. I have been reading a lot of novels and books on leadership. Currently, I am finishing Louise Erdrich’s Tales of Burning Love and listening to Simon Sineck’s Leaders Eat Last. I am always reading one fiction and one non-fiction book. This may seem like a cop-out because I adore so many artists for so many reasons, but I think I’m somehow in conversation with all of them. Every artist alive now and every artist who has ever worked.

What is one of you biggest takeaways from the residency?

My time at Ramona Residency was exactly what I needed to grow as an artist and create a plan for my practice moving forward. Sarah Sudhoff, the founder and director is a brilliant connector. Before I came to Ramona, I did not realize how much I needed connection to move my work forward. I now realize that I had become too self-sufficient as an artist, to my own detriment.  It has been years since I had the kinds of meaningful exchanges about my work that Sarah set up for me in Houston. It was invigorating to be in an environment where people engaged with my work, spoke to me about it in a meaningful way, and took the time to know me as an artist first and mother/academic second. I came away from this experience engaged more with my work than I have been in years. This residency provided solitude to think and work and a beautiful community that I felt so welcome in. 

I will be moving to Texas soon; to take on the role of Director of the School of art at Texas Tech University in Lubbock and I am so grateful for this community Ramona allowed me to cultivate in Houston. Artists need more connectors; we all could use more of Sarah in our lives.