Pearl Serbanic is a local mixed media artist. (Robert Ruiz/The Times)
If you go:
WHAT: "Psyched Again," mixed-media work of Pearl Serbanic.
WHEN: Through April 29.
WHERE: Prima Tazza, 8835 Line Avenue.
ADMISSION: Free and open to the public. For more information, call the café at (318) 550-0174.
WHAT: "Psyched Again," mixed-media work of Pearl Serbanic.
WHEN: Through April 29.
WHERE: Prima Tazza, 8835 Line Avenue.
ADMISSION: Free and open to the public. For more information, call the café at (318) 550-0174.
jenniferflowers@gannett.com
When Pearl Serbanic isn't in the throes of the creative process, she occasionally gets caught off-guard when her own artwork creeps her out a little.
But that's okay with the mixed-media artist, who strives to evoke that exact type of visceral reaction from her viewers.
Much of her art is influenced by her life experiences, including two kidney transplants she underwent in Shreveport, first in 1981 and later in 1995.
In "Flayed," a mixed-media triptych hanging in her home, eyes stare and claws scratch through a cocoonlike gauze cylinder. Another part of the triptych, made of metal wires submerged beneath beeswax, takes on a semi-transparent, skin-like quality.
Serbanic, 52, got her art degree from LSUS and had her first juried show in 1982 in her late 20s at the Meadows Museum of Art at Centenary College. She returned to LSUS to pursue graduate work in counseling psychology and completed her studies last summer. She now works as a foster parent trainer for sexually abused children and acts as director of counseling at the Hope Medical Group for Women.
Serbanic, who lives in Shreveport, is showing her mixed-media wall sculptures locally at the Prima Tazza coffee shop in an exhibit titled "Psyched Again" through April 29.
QUESTION: Where do you get your inspiration?
ANSWER: I don't really have to get it. It's there every day. I wake up thinking about a form or a feeling and then I start working in a very unconscious way of putting things together to bring out whatever the feeling is that I have.
Q: What type of a visual language do you use in your work?
A: It's probably more subconscious. And I want it to be vague enough so when someone looks at it, it's going to be a personal message to them. They're not going to know what it is. There are amazing responses that people will have when they look at my work.
Q: You said you're an admirer of (American realist) Edward Hopper. Why?
A: I've always admired his work so much 'cause there was always such a sense of something's going on here, which is typically what's happening in peoples' lives. There's always something going on but you may not always know what it is.
Q: Why did you get a master's degree in psychology?
A: I really like art therapy, but I couldn't afford to move away and go to a college that specializes in that, so I created my own field as well as I could in this area.
Q: What do you like about art therapy?
A: For some reason I guess, just working through my own life, I think everybody develops coping skills. And for me art always helped me to work through things, and at a young age I found I had a skill working with others and finding a way for them to get better. And a lot of it involved expressive therapy and different media besides just talking.
Q: Is it hard to keep from bringing your work home with you?
A: A lot of people who think they can council find they can't separate themselves from that. I typically do well. I'm able to leave things alone and not bring them home and mull over it for the rest of the day. Maybe that's what art does. It kind of gives you an outlet for that.
Q: Do you have an ultimate goal in mind for your work?
A: I really don't. My work sort of has a life of its own, and I live by the philosophy of don't push the river. So I just kind of let it flow and see what I need to do next. Because I've had difficult stuff to deal with in my life, art isn't going to be a source of anxiety. If there's a place to show it, fine, put it up on the walls. If not, that's OK.
Q: Could you imagine not fitting art into your already busy schedule?
A: No because it's like food and water to me. It's nourishment. It's a craving. I do something creative every day. Even if I don't have time to go make art per se, then I will go out in my yard, and do something creative. I'll cut something and put it in some water and be creative with it to try to balance out all the analytical things that go on all day. You have to do something intuitive now and then or you'll go crazy.
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