Bold sculptural inspiration with mixed media

by Sandra Marshall

Helen Roger’s love of art is evident in her vibrant expansive multimedia works with her signature
bright mosaic gems.

After a university training in education and psychology, Helen Rogers quickly determined that teaching art would be her calling. Her lifelong passion for art was furthered when she took a teaching sabbatical to follow studio art courses. Helen returned to teaching art, while also exploring more art workshops and courses in Alberta, British Columbia and the State of Washington in which she mastered the techniques of
watercolour, acrylic and oil painting. Helen was inspired by work in 3 dimensions and she joined the Sculptors Association of Alberta, improving her skills sculpting solid materials: wood, clay, concrete, stone, welded steel, and ice. Always weaving her new skills into her art classes, Helen soon realized that sculpture was her artistic element. Even her two dimensional art is livened with elements of sculpture.

Rogers continued teaching art until she retired and she and her husband moved to Ottawa from Alberta to be closer to their daughter. In her new Ottawa environment, Helen joined several art groups – the Ottawa Mixed Media Artists, Ottawa Arteast, National Capital Network of Sculptors – exploring many different materials and new perspectives. But a trip to Italy and Spain kindled a love of mosaics, especially the massive mosaic works of Nikki de Saint Phalle and Antoni Gaudi. The spark that they kindled inspired Helen to teach herself this craft. She attended mosaics conferences and workshops to enlarge her perspectives. Today they form part of her
signature mixed media sculptures.

Helen Rogers rarely begins a project with a plan. Her “supply” room provides the inspiration –
as her daughter says – “Creative people never have a mess, they just have ideas lying around
everywhere“. She connects a few scraps with others until an idea takes shape and art emerges.
The spark is ignited and she know exactly how to proceed. Sometimes this happens during a
sleepless nighttime period of incubation where she discovers her solution and can then sleep in
peace. But in one less peaceful mosaic project, she employed a black grout and when she
realized that the grout should have been white, it was too late to go back! Usually her work in
the construction phase can be undone, but not with cement grout.
Lesson learned.

Helen says that there is no philosophical meaning in any of her sculptures. The onlooker can decide what they see. If a viewer is curious about the process, Helen is happy to explain: Step 1. Choose a substrate. In the case illustrated, a construction tube has been cut up and taped together to form the base structure.
Step 2. Cover the structure with plaster-infused bandage, adding more texture as needed. Step 3. With tile adhesive, apply mosaic materials such as pieces of stained glass, tiles and mirror to chosen parts of the sculpture surface. Then apply grout to all this and then wipe off the excess and leave overnight to harden. Next day, Helen adds crushed tin foil to some of the sculpture using a glue gun. She adds embellishing materials- glass beads, wire, eucalyptus
seed pods, pieces of copper, and anything else that might work to finish the surface to her satisfaction. Lastly, she decides when enough is enough and declares the sculpture finished!

Helen Rogers has no concrete plans for her art, except to enjoy the process of making, and she
is quite content with that. Helen does not like marketing and has decided that she doesn’t need
that stress. Post covid recently, she felt privileged to be able to conduct a two day mosaic
workshop at the Boys and Girls Club. Ten children of various ages participated in the workshop:
One foot square IKEA mirror-frames donated by a member of Ottawa’s Network of Sculptors
were used as the mosaic ground. Rogers had assembled many different coloured tiles and
glass beads for the kids to mosaic the mirrors. Their imaginations were inspired. They all had a
wonderful time!

Her advice to novices is to do what you enjoy doing. Whatever art you enjoy, just do it! Helen knows both artists with formal training and those without can be equally successful. Selling your art requires marketing skills. Sometimes not-so-great art can sell with great marketing. So if you want to sell your art, learn good marketing skills or find someone to do this for you.
One thing Helen Rogers is sure of – She LOVES building things from scratch. If it becomes a successful work of art, that is a bonus!

See more of Helen’s work at http://www.Helenmosaics.ca