mixed media
13.5" x 19.5"
Monica Bryant Bio Monica Bryant is an artist living in Northern California. Monica Bryant is a mixed-media artist. Her business name Mo Ni Kai Art Studio was inspired the chop her mandarin teacher in Singapore created for her. The experience of living in Singapore 1996 to 1999 expanded her world. She was born in Kansas, received her BA in Art from the University of Hawaii and her MFA from UC Berkeley. In 2004 she was awarded a fellowship at Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York. Bryant is a credentialed Art Teacher who chaired the Art Department at Ursuline High School in Santa Rosa, CA for nine years. After Ursuline closed in 2011, Bryant instructed drawing and color theory at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (FIDM) in San Francisco and other colleges and schools. Bryant is a Sonoma County Art Trails artist and her work has been exhibited nationally and in Singapore. Artist Statement about Between Earth and Sky I still love fairy tales. I particularly like the newer Disney version of Cinderella. To me it is an improvement of the 50’s version because Cinderella and the Prince are caretakers of the kingdom. It is not simply a ‘happily ever after’ tale where getting the prince is the only happiness for Cinderella. The surrealist image Between Earth and Sky, came to me in a dream and I just had to make it. It speaks to the truth of natural limits in life. I am a wife, mother and grandmother. There is pleasure and pain in this role and the natural limits of our life spans. Everyone needs and deserves family and friends that root and care for them. For me, there is tension between wanting home and family and wanting participation in commerce and public dialogue. I belonged to Beauty Project, a group of women artists in the 1990’s. The exhibit, From Glass Slipper to Glass Ceiling, was our reunion exhibit. I’m glad it inspired this work.