On a dirt road a few miles north of Santa Fe, a multidisciplinary artist has been experimenting for decades around how art emerges organically from a willingness to let it do so.
Madelin Coit cites the ever-changing natural world and the mysteries of the human spirit among her inspirations, and the inherent flux of such sources makes her seem as much witness to—as creator of—the work that fills her studio.
One of the keys, she said, when I recently visited her place of work, is her interest in seeing what happens when she keeps playing with a single concept.
"I just get very involved with taking one idea and following it to a lot of its iterations, because I think that that's true. I think that with people, I think that with properties, I think that with money, with just about everything—relationships—if you could let it go to all of its iterations, all of its formats, it's going to be more fun."
Coit said this as we were looking at a series of small mounted pieces made of polycarbonate, sheeting, and wire.
They are part of her Ablate Series, an ongoing study in, as she put it, "taking things apart."
Each work was composed of white, gently curved material, with long thin rectangles, sliced out of the piece yet still attached.
Viewing such pieces, one is compelled to look not only at the object itself but at its gaps and holes and the way the changing light of the day casts shadows and reflections.
" I clearly love shadows; I find them inspiring and I find them secretive and then they expand and let you in."
A native New Englander who spent about 20 years in California before moving to Santa Fe in the 90s, Coit has explored a range of media and creative strategies ever since working toward her bachelor of fine arts at the University of Connecticut in the 1960s.
She enjoyed those undergraduate experiences but said she also faced resistance from her mentors.
" I was actually probably schooled in a way where if you're really happy with your work, A, it can't be very good, and B, you're being too boastful. You're a female. I had a teacher say to me, 'Madelin, you're a good artist. Why don't you marry so and so? He's not as good, but you can run his career.'"
Unbowed by such prejudice, Coit focused on her work, and developed fluency in a range of media, including sprayed-oil paintings, drawings, sculpture, video projection, prints, and neon.
Not long after moving to Venice, California in the 70s, Coit began landing prominent exhibitions, accolades, and sales.
Several of her visual art pieces also highlight another art form for which she has long had talent and passion: writing.
Her Tesuque studio features a piece hanging near the entrance, entitled "The Big Bamboo."
It is an old metal window blind, each worn slat filled with the plastic letters of an original poem that Coit said is a reflection on her own life. Here’s an excerpt:
"She gazes through a tunnel made by slim green and yellow striped bamboo to the end of a lap pool, then up the trunks of Canary Island Pines, those giants with pom-pom bundles of 10 inch needles, two to 300 feet tall, to tickle the sky."
Nature is central to Madelin Coit’s life and work.
The windows of her Tesuque studio provide an expansive view of the New Mexico landscape: mountains in the distance;, her gardens of fruit, greens, and flowers; and a constant stream of visiting wildlife, including a family of house finches, which she had been recently studying as if she were a psychologist serving the avian world.
Coit said has been particularly impressed with the sights lately provided by the New Mexico sky.
" I woke up very early about two, three weeks ago. The clouds have been very special this year. I think, and I've been looking at them for quite a while and they were gold with a slight pink on under crust, and one had a gray under crust and I couldn't believe it. And I did get up and I took a picture and I wasn't going to, because I didn't wanna take my eyes off of it."
Several museum collections feature the work of Madelin Coit, including Santa Fe's New Mexico Museum of Art and the Vladem Contemporary Art Museum.
After spending about an hour with the artist, I asked whether my impression was right—that she seemed to be saying that her work was happening around her as much as it was being made by her.
"You are getting it right. And that's how I think and feel. I have no idea if that's the truth or not, but it doesn't matter. If it's not the truth, I still like it," Coit said.
"I don't know how to put it in some profound way. What matters? Well, dinner if you're hungry. Love, if you're lucky. Intimacy, if you're very lucky. Sitting here looking at the mountain, because we are very lucky. It's beautiful."
You can learn more about Tesuque-based artist Madelin Coit on her website.