Melissa Zink (1932–2009) was an American artist. An active member of the

Taos, New Mexico Taos () is a town in Taos County, New Mexico, Taos County, in the north-central region of New Mexico in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Initially founded in 1615, it was intermittently occupied until its formal establishment in 1795 by Santa Fe ...

art scene, she blended storytelling with sculpture, and described the enchantment of books and the imaginary worlds they evoked as the focus of her work. Critics lauded her as a "late bloomer" because she only began to exhibit and sell her multi-media works of ceramics, cast bronze, and

collage Collage (, from the , "to glue" or "to stick together") is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assembly of different forms, thus creating a new whole. (Compare with pasti ...

, when she was in her forties. She became known for her "three-dimensional stories" and "dream-like dioramas" in clay, interior scenes that blend whimsy with

surrealism Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

. Later she cast large bronze statues of human figures embossed with texts drawn from dictionaries and

illuminated manuscript An illuminated manuscript is a formally prepared manuscript, document where the text is decorated with flourishes such as marginalia, borders and Miniature (illuminated manuscript), miniature illustrations. Often used in the Roman Catholic Churc ...

s. In 2001 she won a Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts from the state of

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

. In 2021, one of her works featured in a special exhibit at the

New Mexico Museum of Art The New Mexico Museum of Art is an art museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Santa Fe governed by the state of New Mexico, United States. It is one of four state-run museums in Santa Fe that are part of the Museum of New Mexico. It is located one bloc ...

entitled, "Southwest Rising: Contemporary Art and the Legacy of Elaine Horwich," which featured a group of artists in the 1970s and 1980s who together launched a movement described as "new Western art" or "Southwest pop".

Education and career

Melissa Zink was born in

Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City, Missouri, abbreviated KC or KCMO, is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri by List of cities in Missouri, population and area. The city lies within Jackson County, Missouri, Jackson, Clay County, Missouri, Clay, and Pl ...

. She attended the

Emma Willard School Emma Willard School, originally called Troy Female Seminary and often referred to simply as Emma, is an independent university-preparatory day and boarding school for young women located in Troy, New York. Located on Mount Ida, it offers grade ...

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the e ...

, the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

, and the

Kansas City Art Institute The Kansas City Art Institute (KCAI) is a private art school in Kansas City, Missouri. The college was founded in 1885 and is an accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and Higher Learning Commission. The institute ...

. She later admitted that her professors' efforts to push her and her peers towards

abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...

during the 1950s deterred her from pursuing a career in art. Instead she worked for many years by designing picture frames and operating an embroidery and craft shop while continuing to paint and experiment with various media in her free time. In her forties, she married Nelson Zink, who encouraged her to pursue her artistic ambitions. The owner of the Parks Gallery in Taos, which represented her for many years, described her works as aiming to replicate through multi-media art the "book experience, that altered state of consciousness we enter when engrossed in a book." Though known primarily for her clay dioramas and bronze figural sculptures, in later years she also created multi-media, collage wall hangings that incorporated fabrics and painted elements. In 2000 Zink represented New Mexico at an exhibit of women artists called ''From the States'' held at Washington, D.C.'s

National Museum of Women in the Arts The National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA), located in Washington, D.C., is "the first museum in the world solely dedicated" to championing women through the arts. NMWA was incorporated in 1981 by Wallace and Wilhelmina Holladay. Since openi ...

. In 2006 the

Harwood Museum of Art The Harwood Museum of Art is located in Taos, NM, Taos, New Mexico. Founded in 1923 by the Harwood Foundation, it is the second oldest art museum in New Mexico. Its collections include a wide range of Hispanic works and visual arts from the Ta ...

in Taos staged an exhibition on her work. In 2009, following her death, the

Taos Art Museum The Taos Art Museum is an art museum located in Taos, New Mexico in the Nicolai Fechin House. This was the home of Russian artist Nicolai Fechin, his wife Alexandra, and daughter Eya. The museum's primary aims are to improve awareness of the works ...

and Fechin House staged a memorial exhibition entitled, "Melissa Zink: Her Singular World." She featured among leading women artists in the book ''Exposures: Women & Their Art'' by Betty Ann Brown (1989). Work by Zink is in the collection of the Harwood Museum of Art, the

, the

Albuquerque Museum of Art and History The Albuquerque Museum, formerly known as the Albuquerque Museum of Art and History, is a public art and history museum in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It is located in the Old Town area and is operated by the City of Albuquerque Department of Arts & ...

, and the

Roswell Museum and Art Center The Roswell Museum (formerly Roswell Museum and Art Center) was founded in 1936 and is located in Roswell, New Mexico, United States. The museum features exhibits about the art and history of the American Southwest The Southwestern United S ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zink, Melissa 1932 births 2009 deaths 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American women sculptors 21st-century American artists 21st-century American sculptors 21st-century American women sculptors Kansas City Art Institute alumni Sculptors from New Mexico Swarthmore College alumni University of Chicago alumni