/ by Tasha L. Harrison /photography by Latoya Dixon Smith
A deep connection to nature is clearly evident in the work of Sunny Mullarkey. The back of a moth can become a frame for a mountain range and the night sky. A feather can contain a waterfall. It’s a juxtaposition that reimagines natural forms in a way that melds the tribe art of the Pacific Northwest with southern ecology.
The way Mullarkey brings these elements together is even more impressive when you consider the detail is carved into a block of wood to create a print; a micro level attention to detail that is a Mullarkey thumbprint. “I’m drawn to the little things that are often overlooked. Things like beetles and moths, things that have so much intention, purpose, and natural design fascinate me.”
Printmaking is a medium with a lot of steps in the creative process. Sketches become drawings, drawings become carved images in lino or wood block, and finally, those carvings are used to create prints. Mullarkey dives into every part of the process and enjoys the physicality involved in each piece. The joy is evident in every groove made by the chisel that gives a piece its own fluidity.
In new work, Mullarkey explores playful realism and layers of pattern-on-pattern at a macro level. The grids and broken circles may seem like Mullarkey is having fun with geometric shapes but in reality, they are thirty-thousand-foot scenes of landscape. This series entitled, Imaginary Boundaries, was inspired by the view out of an airplane window on a recent trip to Denver.
“We were flying over really flat, agricultural land. And, from that distance it was all crazy grids with no pattern with lots of circles that met or didn’t meet in haphazard ways. It was just a perspective I would have never seen on the ground,” she says. “Just that shift in perspective made me realize that I am a tiny speck in all of this.”
Her work and the way she talks about it is reminiscent of Romanticism, an art and literature movement in the late 18th and well into the 19th century that, according to Isaiah Berlin, centered on “an effort to return to the forgotten sources of life, a passionate effort at self-assertion both individual and collective.”
Mullarkey’s modern romantic exploration of the world is one where humans can find their humanity within natural design.
“I’m drawn to the little things that are often overlooked. Things like beetles and moths, things that have so much intention, purpose, and natural design fascinate me.”
—Sunny Mullarkey
Paint the Town Sunny
It might be possible to be a resident of Greenville and not have seen the framed art of Sunny Mullarkey, but I highly doubt if you’ve never seen her work. Take a walk around The Village of West Greenville, nearly every business has a sign painted by her hand. Fun, colorful, sometimes abstract murals also grace walls across town including the north-facing wall of Project Host on Academy St., the east-facing wall of Hammack Law Firm, part of The Stone Mural Project, and a new mural inside of The Commons for GB&D.
The growth her career has experienced over the last two to three years is evident by the number of murals she’s painted. Anywhere in Greenville, if you tilt your head just so, you’ll see Sunny. It has solidified her as not just an artist, but a highly recognizable local brand.
The t-shirt and poster art from last year’s 15th annual Artisphere also featured her design. “It was my first year as a participating artist at Artisphere, after being waitlisted for years, and then I got in and they asked me to design the poster.”
Sunny Mullarkey is returning to Artisphere, find her (and her bees, bugs and arcs) at booth 123.
Find her murals here:
Art & Light Gallery
16 Aiken St.
mural in partership with Eva Magill Oliver
Hammack Law Firm
223 W. Stone Ave.
Part of the Stone Mural Project
Project Host
525 S. Academy St
In partnership with Leadership Greenville
If you’ve ever wanted to see a mural in action, Mullarkey is the featured muralist for ArtFields 2020; the mural will depict native birds. Learn more about ArtFields and Lake City, SC in our trip travel story, Detours.
