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Masha Archer is an elegant lady, a unique and intense artist with a fascinating history. Having seen her work, I became curious about the woman behind the art, the inspiration for her talent, and the choices she had made along life’s journey—choices that have allowed her to raise a family while designing and creating a collection of wearable art that has caught the eye of celebrities and ordinary women captivated by beautiful things. Although we had spoken on the phone several times, it was on Thanksgiving weekend 2007 that I finally had the pleasure of meeting Masha at her annual Saks Fifth Avenue trunk show in New York City. She graciously agreed to a telephone interview, which is the basis of this article. __ Marianna Zajac Masha, aka Maria Muchyn-Archer, was bom in Kyiv to the renowned sculptor Mykola (Bohdan) Muchyn and Sophia Muchyn, a painter. Both parents taught painting and sculpture at the Kyiv and Kharkiv Art Institutes, their careers cut short by World War II and the post-war turmoil that forced the family to flee from the Soviet Union and seek a new life. Living in an American displaced persons camp in Gottingen, Germany until 1949, the Muchyns, like countless other refugees, emigrated to the United States and settled in Philadelphia. No matter where life took them, Masha vividly remembers her family enveloping her in the arts. She acknowledges that her artistic interest and talents were inherited, nurtured, and developed in an environment where art was a constant, living presence. Life in the Muchyn home was permeated with conversations about artistic technique, art re views, color, patterns, and style, and these discus sion shaped and motivated the young Masha, spurring her formidable development as a an artist. Masha’s formal art education began at the Pratt Institute in New York City. Although she admits that this experience broadened and extended her interests into graphic design and painting, she commented that American art schools fall short of European institutions in their breadth of subject matter. Leaving Pratt early, she accepted a job as a restorer and exhibitor at the Museo Nacional de Mexico. It was in Mexico that Masha met her future husband, art photographer Charles Homer Archer, an alumnus of the fabled Black Mountain College of North Carolina. Masha and Charles and their firstborn Maya lived in the Yucatan jungle but moved in the 1960s—first to Tucson and then to San Francisco. It was during this period in her artistic development, that Masha redirected her training in graphic design into clothing design, translating her ideas into garments with a harmo nious mixture of brilliant colors and patterns. In the early 1980s, Masha began working on her Art-to-Wear jewelry line. Critics agree that her stylish necklaces, earrings, and hair ornaments are extraordinary. Her creative design process begins with a conceptualization in her mind’s eye, leading Masha Archer Видання C оюзу Українок A мерики - перевидано в електронному форматі в 2012 році . A рхів C У A - Ню Йорк , Н . Й . C Ш A.
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