CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 10/19/2019

Tiny but mighty 'Magdalena Suarez Frimkess' is a Staff Favorite for Fall 2019

Featured image is reproduced from staff favorite, Magdalena Suarez Frimkess, the first monograph ever published on the nonagenarian Venice Beach ceramicist, which is a wonderful book in its own right, but also comes with a fold-out newsprint poster of the Felix the Cat figure reproduced on the cover. "Whenever I visit Magdalena," Ricky Swallow writes, "we view her pieces in progress and chat during the semi-chaotic ritual of making tea. She will often say: 'I'm not on my overseas vacation anymore, but in a way I'm still there because I'm drawing everything from my trip onto my works' or 'I was just looking at stuff and then I found this cartoon which is so funny, so I have to paint it—you know, the cartoons give me my daily philosophy.' She will always gleefully reference the pleasure associated with images, life and work. Whether she is glazing tiles, pots or tortilla plates, every surface becomes a type of depository of sorts: an area to set, sort and combine images of personal importance."