Artist Bytes: The Art of Patricia Goodrich

Patricia Goodrich

It is my great pleasure to publish the first Artist Bytes Profile on my friend and fellow artist, Patricia Goodrich from the USA.  We first met in May 2009 during the 2nd Spring Festival for the Visual Arts: Art, Storks and Nature in Rabat-Sale Morocco and became reacquainted in March 2010 during the 8th International Women’s Festival: Art and Development in Asillah, Morocco. She is a published poet and multidisciplinary artist, who makes sculptures, paintings and mixed media installations. From the 14-24th August the Inirii Museum in Alba Iulia, Romania will present a solo exhibition of her work titled Art Beyond Borders that is sponsored by the Romanian Inter-Art Foundation . The Virtual Artist’s Collective published a book of her poetry titled Red Mud in 2009, and will release another book On the line of the Orient Express around fall this year.

Patricia is a perfect example of the itinerant artist. In the last few years her  art has taken her on expeditions throughout the USA, Europe, and Africa. I imagine her artworks to be pinpoints on a map of the world,  that enable us to follow the trails of Patricia’s expansive artistic career.  The  artist often uses materials found on location and she has an intuitive understanding of the way that landscape shapes and defines our experience of place. Whether it be the  traced  lines of paint and pigment on canvas; the carved organic forms made from wood, salt, stone or steel; recorded voices of international artists on cassette tapes for her Voices Underground Audio Project; or the words and rhythms of her poetry, all of her creative works follow the contours of the landscape and capture a moment in which the artist engaged with, and attempted to become a part of, her immediate environment.

If any one person can demonstrate the benefit of intercultural exchange and involvement in artist’s workshops and conferences, it would be Patricia. Through constant exposure to the perspectives of diverse International artists, cultures and countries, she has shaped a unique perception of the world through her art and established herself a home within a global artistic community.

The following piece of writing  provides an insight into one of the artist’s festival experiences.

View of Asillah Morocco

Shifting Sands: Morocco’s Creative Women Festival
Written by Patricia Goodrich

Two months have passed since the Festival of Creative Women: Art & Development in Asillah, Morocco, and here in the USA I feel its influence almost daily.  Last night I opened an email from Fatima, a painter whose vibrant colors reached from her clothing right into her art works, a woman with whom I shared a circle of conversation and fresh brewed tea along the sea near the walls of the old city medina.

Patricia and Fatima

This was a conference/exhibition where time was available to become acquainted, to laugh, and to communicate in the universal language of art stitched together with French, Arabic, Berber, English, and a good measure of gestures.  Sufi music, couture fashion, meeting the Princess Charifa Lalla Oum Keltoum, walks through the winding medina streets and along the sea, the warm hospitality of our hosts— all were there.  And still with me here, as I search out possibilities for the craftswomen to exhibit their works here, a desert and ocean away.

Patricia with Mina Boutoutla, President of the Artisans Cooperative in the North Atlas mountains and Asass Khan.

Sufi Musicians

The work I chose to exhibit, two abstract paintings from my Rivers Without Boundaries series, another titled The Fire Within, and  Almost Perfect, an egg-shaped jadeite sculpture, were influenced in part by my misconception that figurative work should be avoided in Morocco, a largely Islamic country. Yet when I arrived at the festival, I found the women were creating portraits, landscape, abstract works, often incorporating cultural symbols and colors into canvases, graphics, and even into traditionally woven fabrics, rugs and blankets.  Yet, my own selections did reflect the festival: art pushing beyond boundaries, created from an inner spirit and passion, celebrating the imperfection of what it is to be human.

Patricia Goodrich, Rivers Without Boundaries (one of a series), acrylic on canvas, 2010. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Patricia Goodrich, Almost Perfect, polished jadeite stone, 2010. Photo courtesy of the artist.

The festival, founded eight years ago by Wafaa el Houdaybi and supported by the Association of Contemporary Artists with the patronage of the Princess, benefits not only the women painters, sculptors, and crafts artists, it inspires and informs non-Moroccan artists like me through the connections we make and by erasing preconceptions of what it is to be a Muslim woman creating art.  The Festival also promotes connection and economic development among the Moroccan artists.  For instance, two of the crafts artists represented a cooperative of women weavers from the Atlas Mountains and another woman and her husband brought their hand-woven fabrics used for finest quality traditional garments. Joining the company of the Moroccan artists were also dynamic artists Kim Goldsmith from Australia and Natasha Novak from Slovenia.  We were four continents drawn together!

Natasha Novak, Kim Goldsmith, Wafaa El Houdaybi and Patricia Goodrich

Married couple Hamzaoui Aycha and Ole Bzou presenting their silk woven fabrics.

Yet, men were not excluded.  In fact, their participation was integral to the conference and its influence on me. Knowledgeable, progressive men from Egypt, the Emirates, and Morocco spoke about the origin and influence of Berber language and the bridge between traditional and modern architecture.  Art critics reviewed the exhibitions. More, they interacted with conference participants over long conversations, shared meals, and much drinking of mint tea.

Patricia with exhibition guests at King Mohammed's palace in Asillah

This Festival reminded me we are grains of sand shifting in a common desert, waves in the same ocean. How grateful I am to share this world of arts and artists and appreciators of it all.

Morrocan artists and craftspeople with Patricia in the gallery, Asillah