A Little Bit of Romania in Monterey, California
(Short Interview with the Sunseri Family)
By: Iolanda Scripca
San Diego, CA
By: Iolanda Scripca
San Diego, CA
A violent “asthma of the soul” cough made me reconsider my priorities of this Californian winter. It seems I have been so busy with life that I forgot to live…
The reinforced concrete of the large Metropolis was holding me hostage within a cocoon full of social and environmental pollution, with “graffiti” carved deeply in the local psych. The sole escape was through the upper opening, towards a tired sky, but of a borderless freedom. Suddenly, I decided that my shoulder blades would not be scarred remainders of my broken dreams but orange with black wings, wings of the Monarch butterflies which migrate by the millions, every winter, to Monterey, California.
Santa Ana winds were pushing me West, away from the immorality of the souls dried by the sands of the Mojave dessert. A painful longing of my past experiences of a high spirituality was sustaining the altitude of my wish to revisit a place of artistic Heaven, where the ocean maintains the symphonic “Rhythm of the Rocks”, where childhood feeds itself with a continuous and curious delight of the sealife “Whale Watching,” “Pelican Can Can,” “Sardine Song,” “Sea Lion Shuffle,” “Tidepools” (titles of original songs by MaryLee Sunseri), where wild deer wander through the yard in the middle of the forest like art lovers admiring the artist’s sculptures, and where, literally, dogs (Charlie) sleep in trees.
It was time to meet again: Frank Sunseri—sculptor, painter, poet, and his wife, MaryLee Sunseri—artist, singer and composer of children’s songs.
I parked my car next to a tall, forged iron fence which glittered with rays of the sunset over the Pacific ocean. The gates of the past opened wide like the warm arms of eternal Beauty.
All of a sudden I froze in wonder. Was that the whisper of the Romanian pan flute crying among the bay leaves of Monterey, California? No, such a thing is impossible!
My heart started aching for the Romania I used to know, with thick forests where only my grandfather and I picked mushrooms on my summer vacations, where rivers giggled full of playful trout and where a blond little girl was losing herself happily among the wild flowers of a world where nothing bad could happen to her. And yet, I was still hearing the wind playing the pan flute through the Californian pines…
The door of the Sunseri’s cabin was wide open. I was expected for this interview. I entered a comfortable room, full of musical instruments, where even the wood in the fireplace was cracking on the cinder in an enchanting musical rhythm. In the backyard, in the forest next to the ocean, stood Frank’s studio, a place where his talent and inspiration materialize through an original series of sculptures. We sat down next to the hot fire, exactly like fifteen years ago, when I last visited, only that, now, two armchairs were empty…my parents.
Iolanda Scripca: As the late Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi said: the people who call my work “abstract” are imbeciles…what they call “abstract” is , in fact, the purest Realism, the reality of which is not represented by external form but by the idea behind it., the essence of the work.
Frank Sunseri, could you explain to the readers what is the essence of your wonderful sculptures?
Frank Sunseri: I call my sculptures “Free Form” rather than abstract because they are not abstractions of realities, instead, they are new realities of their own. They are slowly peeled from my sub-conscious mind with no representational meaning other than pure, elegant, balanced form from Nature’s own exquisite material. “The stone speaks…and then I carve.”
All of a sudden I startled with wonder…Was the storm over the dark Pacific screaming through the pipes of the Romanian pan flute? The hot flames from the fireplace were throwing shadows and lights caressing the two empty armchairs…
Anda, I am so sorry to hear about your parents’passing.”
Thank you, MaryLee!—and I closed my eyes…
A musical tidal wave pulled me back in the past of the enchanting faces of pure and beautiful Romanian girls, where healthy grapevines burst with sweetness and where horses gallop worriless rinsing their manes in the blond waterfalls of wheat…and I made myself one with the earth back home and threw myself on the pottery wheel from Voronet and I tattooed myself with the eternal rainbow of the beauty of the soul…A deafening pleasure made me open my eyes…Frank Sunseri was just ending a tune at the pan flute.
The reinforced concrete of the large Metropolis was holding me hostage within a cocoon full of social and environmental pollution, with “graffiti” carved deeply in the local psych. The sole escape was through the upper opening, towards a tired sky, but of a borderless freedom. Suddenly, I decided that my shoulder blades would not be scarred remainders of my broken dreams but orange with black wings, wings of the Monarch butterflies which migrate by the millions, every winter, to Monterey, California.
Santa Ana winds were pushing me West, away from the immorality of the souls dried by the sands of the Mojave dessert. A painful longing of my past experiences of a high spirituality was sustaining the altitude of my wish to revisit a place of artistic Heaven, where the ocean maintains the symphonic “Rhythm of the Rocks”, where childhood feeds itself with a continuous and curious delight of the sealife “Whale Watching,” “Pelican Can Can,” “Sardine Song,” “Sea Lion Shuffle,” “Tidepools” (titles of original songs by MaryLee Sunseri), where wild deer wander through the yard in the middle of the forest like art lovers admiring the artist’s sculptures, and where, literally, dogs (Charlie) sleep in trees.
It was time to meet again: Frank Sunseri—sculptor, painter, poet, and his wife, MaryLee Sunseri—artist, singer and composer of children’s songs.
I parked my car next to a tall, forged iron fence which glittered with rays of the sunset over the Pacific ocean. The gates of the past opened wide like the warm arms of eternal Beauty.
All of a sudden I froze in wonder. Was that the whisper of the Romanian pan flute crying among the bay leaves of Monterey, California? No, such a thing is impossible!
My heart started aching for the Romania I used to know, with thick forests where only my grandfather and I picked mushrooms on my summer vacations, where rivers giggled full of playful trout and where a blond little girl was losing herself happily among the wild flowers of a world where nothing bad could happen to her. And yet, I was still hearing the wind playing the pan flute through the Californian pines…
The door of the Sunseri’s cabin was wide open. I was expected for this interview. I entered a comfortable room, full of musical instruments, where even the wood in the fireplace was cracking on the cinder in an enchanting musical rhythm. In the backyard, in the forest next to the ocean, stood Frank’s studio, a place where his talent and inspiration materialize through an original series of sculptures. We sat down next to the hot fire, exactly like fifteen years ago, when I last visited, only that, now, two armchairs were empty…my parents.
Iolanda Scripca: As the late Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi said: the people who call my work “abstract” are imbeciles…what they call “abstract” is , in fact, the purest Realism, the reality of which is not represented by external form but by the idea behind it., the essence of the work.
Frank Sunseri, could you explain to the readers what is the essence of your wonderful sculptures?
Frank Sunseri: I call my sculptures “Free Form” rather than abstract because they are not abstractions of realities, instead, they are new realities of their own. They are slowly peeled from my sub-
All of a sudden I startled with wonder…Was the storm over the dark Pacific screaming through the pipes of the Romanian pan flute? The hot flames from the fireplace were throwing shadows and lights caressing the two empty armchairs…
Anda, I am so sorry to hear about your parents’passing.”
Thank you, MaryLee!—and I closed my eyes…
A musical tidal wave pulled me back in the past of the enchanting faces of pure and beautiful Romanian girls, where healthy grapevines burst with sweetness and where horses gallop worriless rinsing their manes in the blond waterfalls of wheat…and I made myself one with the earth back home and threw myself on the pottery wheel from Voronet and I tattooed myself with the eternal rainbow of the beauty of the soul…A deafening pleasure made me open my eyes…Frank Sunseri was just ending a tune at the pan flute.
Anda, do you remember your parents’ gift to us, fifteen years ago?”
Yes! Now I know…it was the pan flute given to the Sunseri’s…and I glanced at the two armchairs which, now, were not unoccupied any longer.
Iolanda Scripca: I was very impressed what a real artist can do with a simple gift given from the heart: not only to recreate a little bit of Romanian spirit by making high quality pan flutes, but, also, to personalize this instrument with tunes of your artistic soul. Frank Sunseri, as an American artist, what do you feel insights your heart when playing the Romanian pan flute?
Frank Suseri: I feel an affinity toward Romanian culture. T heir passionate appreciation of art and music is an attribute many Americans do not have. When I first blew air into the Romanian pan flute, it was as familiar as the first time I put chisel to stone. Both were like ancient memories re-
Iolanda Scripca: Frank, when we visited your home studio I saw your paintings called “Chaos Corners” and “Martian Moonscape.” They were a combination of pure joy of color and freedom of expression. Can you describe the moments prior to picking up the paint brush? Where you closer to God or closer to unruliness?
Frank Sunseri: The process of art is to bring order out of chaos. There is nothing more unruly than a blank canvas or an uncarved block of stone. For me, the completion of an art piece is a step closer to order, to nature, and, yes, to God.
Iolanda Scripca: Frank and MaryLee, I always admired you as a couple of artistic souls who found each other in this universe. Have you ever collaborated in any forms of art?
MaryLee Sunseri: Frank and I collaborate in the kitchen quite a bit! And all around our little cabin are signs of us working together to make our very small living space practical, simple and easy to care for—so we can get on with our art and music. We, sometimes, play mandolins together just for fun and my husband has always encouraged my artwork. Frank played a beautiful, improvised melody on pan flute for my recording of “The Rice Harvest Lullaby” (on the CD album “Rhythm of The Rocks”). It’s what you hear playing on his web site when you visit the pan flute page.
Also, when we travel together we share experiences, places, landscapes and the superb sounds of Nature. Then we come back home and the process of creation starts.
The darkness was pulling me out of the cabin.
I said “Goodbye!” to my friends, I threw a last glance at the play of light-
It is said that when you do not have parents anymore you cease to be a kid….
Stars with untied shoelaces were chasing one another along the windshield of my car like the musical notes from MaryLee’s children’s songs. I stepped on the gas along the Pacific, with the sunroof entirely open so Dad could spray my face with the marine drizzle and Mom to give me a funny perm from the speed of my car.
I was alive again and I was not afraid of the dark.
After several hours I took a right turn and exited towards Reality. I got out of the car with a red nose and red cheeks, with my hair tangled, with a naughty smile…and a suitcase overloaded of the eternal purity of Childhood.