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24 | March 15, 2018 | The Mokena Messenger life & arts
mokenamessenger.com
Joyce Symoniak shines light on technique during Meet the Artist event
Laurie Fanelli
Freelance Reporter
Life unfolds in shades of
gray. Shadows accent a sunny
afternoon, and even the thickest
of fogs can be pierced by
a beam of sunlight.
The work of Mokena resident
Joyce Symoniak — this
month’s featured artist at the
Orland Park Public Library
— examines the power of
light and reflections through
peaceful gray scale drawings,
created to harmoniously accent
her smoky landscapes.
She paints images onto a
clay canvas, using a variety
of smoke sources — including
candles, propane and oil
lamps — to create unique,
serene designs.
Library patrons had the
chance to chat with Symoniak
about her work and its inspirations
during this month’s
Meet the Artist presentation,
held Friday, March 2.
Homer Glen resident Steve
Daily took the opportunity to
ask Symoniak about her influences
during the event.
“The pictures she does
have a real simplicity and
beauty,” he said. “I noticed
in her bio that she talked a
little bit about the work having
a Taoism effect, so I was
intrigued.”
Symoniak explained that
she discovered the smoking
technique — first created
by Austrian artist Wolfgang
Paalen — while researching
new methods to help inspire a
student through a tough time
while she was teaching at the
College of DuPage.
“The more I did it, the
more I fell in love with it,”
she said. “What I’ve found
works best for me is, I pair
it with graphite, because
they’re both the same carbon
combination, between the
smoke and the graphite. I use
a clay board, which is a piece
of masonite with clay baked
onto the surface.”
She went on to say she often
uses sandpaper to create
negative space and highlights
of light in her smoky scenes,
and graphite to make the hard
lines.
“I create most of my images
with smoke,” Symoniak
said. “The marks I make depend
on what I’m creating.
With propane, you get a really
soft mark, and butane is
a little bit harder, and it keeps
going all the way through to
candle marks.”
Landscapes were the focus
of Symoniak’s library display.
While many of the locations
exist in the real world,
she explained that she often
adds elements of fog or foliage
to bring to life the tranquil
scenes that live in her
imagination.
Symoniak’s work will be
on display through the end
of March, and Kip Pasta is
up next as the Artist of the
Month in April. The Orland
Park Public Library has a
packed calendar of events
and activities in the coming
weeks, and months highlighted
by a variety of programs
in conjunction with the Illinois
bicentennial.
“We have so many things
coming up,” said Cathy Di-
Giorgio, an Outreach Department
assistant. “We’re
working on the Illinois bicentennial
this year, so we’re doing
a lot of programming for
that. We’re trying to get everybody
into the library, and
we’re also going to have a really
cool page on our website
about the bicentennial, with
a little bit of trivia and fun
things like that. It was Dec.
3, 1818 when we became a
state, and we’re the 21st state
in the union, so the bicentennial
is a cool time to celebrate
our history.”
More information on upcoming
events at the Orland
Park Public Library can be
found at www.orlandparklibrary.org.
More on the work
of Joyce Symoniak can be
viewed at joycesstudios.com.
Joyce Symoniak provides insight into the inspiration and techniques used to create her art Friday, March 2, during a Meet
the Artist event at Orland Park Public Library. Photo by Laurie Fanelli/22nd Century Media
Steve Daily, of Homer Glen, looks at a piece by Joyce Symoniak.