Estelle L. Roberge

Estelle L. Roberge
Magdalena, New Mexico, USA

STATEMENT

The “Night Walk, Crane Walk” Series stems from my painting impasse during the pandemic. It was a period in my life when I simply could not paint.

The inner dialogue between permanence and impermanence touched all of us. Neighbors and friends died. And the pandemic suggested wider suffering for those who have been marginalized.

The Bird Sanctuaries became my safe place to be, it was a place that brought solace to the situation, evenings of pink and blue over water and guttural cackling songs of cranes.

At the Bosque del Apache and the Ladd S. Gordon Bird Waterflow Complex, I studied the Sandhill Cranes. I knew little about Sandhill Cranes and I was not an expert but I began to teach myself how to be silent enough to observe cranes. The open space, waterways, birdways, and flyways influenced my collages. I read Bird Heaven and Crane Song, and The Book of Cranes followed which was a year-long project which then became a practice. During the migratory season, I go to the refuge about twice a week. Collages of Cranes Dancing, Cranes Walking and Tossing Sticks and Crowds of Cranes emerged. During this time, I missed crowds and perhaps this was one way of coping with the great loss.

One experience became another and I visited the Bosque del Apache on Christmas Eve and wrote this poem.

Observations
on Christmas Eve, Migrations and Cranes

Over at the water’s edge
A bird refuge
Cranes Dance
Night falls
On Christmas Eve

Sky and water pink blue
Against grey cranes
And red crowns
Flickering through
The evening’s misty air.

Wings upward
Then Downward
A smooth landing
Feet first
A crackling guttural song.

Many landings
Of mystical movements
And migrations
Seasonal footsteps.

Singular.
One moment at a time.
Long, lingering.
Lanky
Precise

In harmony with beauty,
And border crossings.
Our feathered friends
Still teaching
Mankind.

BIO

The sixth of nine children, I grew up in Biddeford, Maine within a Franco-American Irish-Canadian household. In a town full of factories among triple-decker tenement buildings, we played in the streets. Adulthood blossomed swiftly. After graduating from the nearby Portland School of Art in Printmaking and the University of Southern Maine in Art Education, I traveled west in search of employment. In 1990, I began a teaching career at Navajo Community College in Tsaile, Arizona, a community college dedicated to the preservation of Navajo traditional life. Later, I pursued an MFA at Idaho State University with a focus on wilderness desert landscapes in South Central Utah. After receiving an MFA degree in Painting, I taught in Maine and Utah for five years. Finally, I made a home in Magdalena, New Mexico where I taught art in local public schools and where I continue to reside.

My teaching practice and interest in wilderness are interwoven and a matter of daily practice. These vast wilderness settings inspire me to abstract landscapes. My work has focused on the interplay of memory, place, and presence within wild terrains. Pre-Covid, I began to think and paint about those who are not in the wilderness by choice, climate emergency refugees at borders around the world. This emergency has occupied my mind for decades.

During the pandemic, my painting practices were altered. I began to construct collages due to an impasse. The medium and practice of collage became my way of coping with pandemic panic. In 2022, I participated in “Putting the Pieces Back Together,” an exhibition at the Bristol Art Museum related to the pandemic and collage. In addition, I presented a selection of The Book of Covid: Unbound at Kolaj Fest in New Orleans and was included in The New Mexico Prospectus #268 Southwest Artist Series. Recently, I have participated in three exhibitions, two of which were pandemic and collage related. In 2024, I exhibited a selection of The Book of Covid: Unbound at the Sun Valley Museum of Art in Idaho and The Book of Cranes at the Macey Performance Center in Socorro and Warehouse 1-10 in New Mexico. The Book of Cranes traveled to the East Coast and was exhibited at the Charles C. Thomas Gallery, Maine College of Art and Design in Portland, Maine to Wyoming where it was exhibited at the Brinton Museum. The triptych, Alligator I.II.III was included in the New Mexico Only Purchase Initiative (Prospectus #272). In addition, I exhibited at the Kind of Small Array, New Mexico in a Solo Exhibition called “Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory,” an exhibition related to my mountain walks. My work is in private collections throughout the United States and Canada.

“Nature is not matter alone, she is also spirit.” -C. G. Jung

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