Galen Koch: [00:00:04] Thank you so much for meeting. I’m glad we get to meet a little bit early. I have some questions about your time at Haystack and your work. When I ask a question, I’ll actually be muting myself when you’re talking so you won’t hear my background noise, so if it sounds really quiet, that’s why.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:00:23] Okay.

Galen Koch: [00:00:25] First, could you just introduce yourself? Who you are, where you live, and what have you been doing for your long life?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:00:34] Okay. My name is Marilyn Pappas, and I’m almost ninety-three years old. I’ve been an artist for over sixty years, mostly during that time working with fabric, collage, and assemblage. I was born in Brockton, Massachusetts. Just a couple of years ago, I had a retrospective show at the Fuller Craft Museum there. I’ve lived, also, in Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Miami. I taught art for forty-one years in those places and have been retired for about twenty-five years now. It’s been wonderful working as a full-time artist since retiring from teaching. I first went to Haystack in 1971.

Galen Koch: [00:01:57] Wow. How did you first hear about Haystack?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:02:06] As an undergraduate, I went to Massachusetts College of Art, and, I don’t know, somehow I knew about Haystack. I was living in Miami at the time, and I wanted to do something different in the summer. I was a single parent at that point and was teaching at Miami Dade, which was at that time a community college. I had the summer off, and my first husband was taking our two children for much of the summer. I wanted to somehow plan something art-related, so I did a lot of research, and one of the places that I knew about and thought I would approach was Haystack. What I ended up doing – I was a visiting artist for four weeks at Haystack. I had never been there, but I knew of it. I was in the craft field and exhibiting for quite a long time, even at that point. I was going to Haystack, and that four weeks changed my life, literally changed my life.

Galen Koch: [00:03:49] Tell me more about that. What was so life-altering?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:03:53] The first two weeks – I could do anything I wanted there. I was just going to be there and could work for four weeks. So the first two weeks was kind of an unusual session with a man named Paolo Soleri. Paolo Soleri was kind of a mystic/architect/engineer, and he was building this community in the Southwest – I don’t know if it was in Arizona or New Mexico – I never was there – but he was getting a lot of publicity at that time. So it was interesting that he was going to give a special session at Haystack, and a lot of people signed up for it who would not necessarily sign up as students, including Bill Wyman, who was a potter and sculptor in Massachusetts who went to Massachusetts College of Art and graduated two years ahead of me. I knew who he was, and I had met him a few times, and we were in the same shows together sometimes, so I saw him at openings in New York and so on. Anyway, a mutual friend of ours who was coming to Boston first to visit arranged for me to drive to Haystack with him, and we were six hours in the car, and that changed my life. I spent most of the next decade with him. We fell in love at Haystack, and it was amazing. At that time, he had taught at Haystack since almost the beginning, when it wasn’t in Deer Isle, when it was at Haystack Mountain. He was one of the early teachers there. Bill was fascinated, as a lot of people were, by the idea that Paolo Soleri was going to give this session. A group of us were there, and I joined in that session. For the first two days of the session, he didn’t arrive, and nobody knew why. We didn’t know what to do because it wasn’t an actual session. So, we were just kind of there at Haystack waiting for Paolo Soleri. He finally came, and it was an interesting two-week session. We could work wherever we wanted, and he gave some talks, and we had crits [critiques]. It was a really interesting group of people. It was wonderful. One of the highlights was we camped overnight on Crotch Island, which is a quarry on an island outside of Stonington. I remember Haystack staff brought food, and they brought a movie; it was shown on the rock sides of the quarry. It was pretty dramatic. We also did a lot of other wonderful things. I remember having a lobster dinner on the rocks; it was an inspired session and an amazing two weeks for me. Before Bill left Haystack, we had made plans to go to Europe at the end of the summer, so we were going to see each other again. I was going anyway, but he ended up going with me. After Europe, I went back to Miami, and he went back to Massachusetts, but we spent the next year figuring out what to do. He was a visiting artist at Miami Dade that year, and the head of the department there offered him a job at what was going to be this new university, Florida International University. Bill accepted it and moved to Miami. He started the sculpture and ceramics departments there. We lived in Miami for two years, and then we moved back to Massachusetts since we both missed New England. While living in Miami, we went back to Haystack. We weren’t actually at Haystack. We rented a house. I think this was in 1973. We rented the house, I think, maybe for a month in Deer Isle. We were in close connection with Haystack, but we weren’t actually there again. I remember one time the whole glass department came over for dinner with us, and we went over there sometimes, too. After Bill left Haystack during that four weeks in 1971, I worked – mostly, I was sewing. So, I would sit on the deck outside the fiber studio, and Ferne Jacobs, who is now a very well-known fiber artist, was the monitor for the session after Paolo Soleri in fibers, with an English weaver. Now, what was his name? He was very well known. Peter Collingwood.  Anyway, Ferne was his assistant, and whenever Ferne wasn’t working, she would come out on the deck and sit next to me. She was wrapping and twining and doing what she does. This was at the beginning of her career. She was young, and we became very good friends, and we are very good friends to this day. I used to go to California regularly, or we would meet in New York. That was another way that Haystack really changed my life because we talk to each other on the phone almost every week. Even though we’re that far away, we’ve just continued as very close friends. So, that was my initial experience of Haystack.

Galen Koch: [00:11:57] That’s lovely. What was your impression of the school, just the way it looked or the way it felt when you first went there?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:12:10] Oh, I was amazingly impressed. I loved Maine anyway because I had been to Maine many times. I grew up in Massachusetts, so I was a true New Englander, I would say. The way it was set up and looked was so beautiful. I loved it. It was inspirational. It was the most wonderful two weeks there. I liked everything about it. I liked the food. I liked the things we did. I liked the people. It was, and it is an amazing place.

Galen Koch: [00:13:05] So, you went back a number of times, right?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:13:09] Yes, I did. I taught a session there with my former graduate student, Bernie Toale, which was called “Papermaking, Collage, and Assemblage.” That was a wonderful session at Haystack, I must say. We really enjoyed the people we had, and they went back and forth. They made handmade paper, and then they worked with me doing things with the handmade paper. That was great. I also went there with Mass Art. I was teaching at Mass Art for the last twenty years of my teaching career. So, we would go – Mass Art started to have a yearly long weekend there. I went to that. I also went to a memorial service. I can’t remember all the things I did. Also, Bill Wyman was a very good friend of Fran and Priscilla Merritt, so we visited them, and that was great, too. Unfortunately, in 1980, Bill Wyman died at age fifty-six of a brain tumor. We had moved back to Massachusetts and certainly did not expect anything like that at that age. At least it brought me back to Massachusetts, but that was a terrible event in my life. I did meet another Bill, Bill Harby, five years later, and we actually were together for thirty years, so I had another whole life. But that time, that decade that started at Haystack, was pretty extraordinary.

Galen Koch: [00:15:53] Of course, you must have memories of Fran and Priscilla.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:16:01] I do. I know their house. They were lovely people. I remember her kitchen. I loved that she had a rocking chair in her kitchen. [laughter] I always wanted to do that, but I never had a kitchen big enough to do it. They were special. The thing that I remember about Fran is that he was so understanding and liberal. He was not at all shocked that Bill Wyman and I were starting to have this great affair at Haystack, and they accepted me. They knew his first wife, and she had been there with him, but they were just so accepting. Bill, at that point, was pretty much separated from his first wife for over two years, but they weren’t divorced. Fran was a true friend. Galen Koch: [00:17:41] A lot of Haystack love stories.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:17:42] I know. People have gotten married at Haystack, too, I think. But I remember that. Yeah. So, it was an amazing time. Fran was the leader of all of that. He was open-minded.

Galen Koch: [00:18:04] What was the year that you rented – was it just one summer when you rented the house?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:18:10] I think that was 1973. We were living, Bill Wyman and I were living in Miami, and we wanted to go back there in some way. But we didn’t want to teach because we were teaching during the year, so we found this house. Oh, she was a potter in Deer Isle. I’ve forgotten her name now, but it was a contemporary house in Deer Isle. That year, I got a National Endowment of the Arts award. I think it was the first year they were giving the artists awards, and we decided we wanted to do something with that money where we could go and work and have our children there, too. We found this house. Laurie Adams was her name, so we rented that house, and it was a great time. It was wonderful.

Galen Koch: [00:19:33] Obviously, now, Deer Isle and Stonington have a pretty vibrant art community year-round. Were there a lot of artists living there, too, that you got to know?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:19:50] There were some. There were some who were living there then, I think. What was his name? Ron Pearson? I think he was living there then. Well, I don’t know if Fred Woell was living there yet or not.

Galen Koch: [00:20:13] I think he may have been.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:20:15] He may have been.

Galen Koch: [00:20:16] Was Mary Nyburg there then already? She might have come later.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:20:24] I don’t remember who else was there, but there were artists there.

Galen Koch: [00:20:33] I have some notes here that you were at Haystack three times in the ’80s, it looks like, and then there are a lot later, like in 2019. Does that sound right?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:20:58] It probably is, yes.

Galen Koch: [00:21:03] How has Haystack changed in the time that you’ve been involved with the school?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:21:13] Well, I think the facilities got better as time went on. Physically, it stayed pretty much the same, except I think maybe a couple of new buildings were made, so it expanded. It didn’t change all that much, except the people who ran it and worked there changed. I didn’t know them as well. But I think one of the things that I loved about it is that, in some ways, it was always magical, and that didn’t change. Always going there, you would have some special experiences.

Galen Koch: [00:22:19] I’m curious, from the different times that you went, what you took away in your own practice, your own craft practice and art practice. Were there any highlights from your time at Haystack that you brought into the studio with you?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:22:45] There were, but I don’t remember exactly what they were. I think that just seeing what everybody else was doing was always an influence. The year that Bernie and I taught that session, it was very interesting to see what people actually made. They were working with collage, assemblage, and handmade paper; at that time, I was too. That was interesting. It was particularly interesting because we did that same session at Penland [School of Craft] the next year, and it wasn’t anywhere near as wonderful. It was okay, but – I don’t know. We wanted to do it again because it went so well that year at Haystack.

Galen Koch: [00:24:06] Some sort of alchemy happened?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:24:09] I think so, and it didn’t happen the next year. It was all right, but it wasn’t the same. Also, at Penland, they treated us like northerners, quote, “Northerners.” It was odd. It was kind of odd.

Galen Koch: [00:24:33] That’s funny.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:24:34] I had been to Penland before and hadn’t felt that, but that particular time, it did.

Galen Koch: [00:24:42] Was that the only course that you taught, or did you teach another workshop?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:24:50] I don’t think I taught another workshop. I went another time; I think I went a couple of times. One time was a conference, or maybe a couple of times for conferences. The last time I went was a conference. But I was there another time, but I don’t think I was teaching.

Galen Koch: [00:25:20] It looks like you went to a couple of workshops in the ’80s, too.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:25:27] I don’t know. Those are the ones I remember.

Galen Koch: [00:25:32] That’s great. Obviously, you’ve been in the craft world for a very long time. How do you view Haystack’s position in the broader craft movement? What does a school like that provide?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:25:50] Well, I think it provides a lot of things. It provides mainly a chance for people to work in the field that they are interested in, or to try another, craftspeople especially. Of course, it has broadened out into digital things as well, but the crafts studios are still there. I think they are. And people are still interested. It gives people with a wide range of abilities, from almost beginners to people who have a lot of experience, to work with someone who has a reputation in their field at that time. I think that a lot of the crafts have been enjoying a renaissance in recent years. I know textiles, fabrics – fibers certainly has. Lots of artists who may be painters or sculptors are working with fabrics, textiles. It gives them a chance, too. People who have not worked in a particular area, who want to maybe add that to their repertoire, let’s say.

Galen Koch: [00:27:51] And do you think Haystack has had an influence on craft?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:27:57] Oh, I think so. I think they must always have an influence, depending on the people who are there, the people who come to work, and what happens afterward. There must be all kinds of influences and ideas. One of the nice things about a Haystack is that it’s not just one area; it’s several areas, and there’s a lot of cross-fertilization. That must affect people in a lot of different ways.

Galen Koch: [00:28:43] Did that affect you, do you think, that cross-fertilization?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:28:49] I think so, especially with ceramics, because Bill Wyman was working in ceramics. I actually used some pieces that he made in my work. I learned a lot more about ceramics when I was with him, and I’m still interested in it. I think there’s all kinds of cross-fertilization happening, and I think over the years, people have tended more to work in multiple areas, not just in one, and I think they could do that at Haystack.

Galen Koch: [00:29:41] Yeah. I’m so curious if, in the time you spent coming to Haystack – in the ’70s, I imagine the demographics might have been a little different. Was it mostly men who were there? Was it men and women, young and old? What was it like?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:30:02] Actually, when I was there for that special session, it was both men and women, young and old. It was an interesting combination of people. For that first two weeks, I was there, maybe there were more people who were experienced who were drawn to that whole idea. There were people who – I remember there was a man who came from Washington. I think he was a graphic artist, Charlie Gailiss. There were a lot of different kinds of people who came to that first session that I went to.

Galen Koch: [00:31:04] Just backing up a little bit because I’m so curious about it. How did you launch into being an artist as a young person? What was your trajectory?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:31:22] I always loved to draw. I always wanted to be an artist. I didn’t have an adolescent time when I didn’t know what to do. I just always knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to be some kind of an artist always, and I wanted to go to an art school or somewhere that had a really art good program. I ended up at Massachusetts College of Art as an undergraduate. I came from a middle-class family; we were not suffering at all, but I knew I had to have a job. I also thought I probably couldn’t make a living as a full-time artist, so I decided that I wanted to be a teacher because I had been working at summer camps as a counselor and was interested in working with children. I started off by majoring in art education at Mass College of Art, and my first job was as Needham, Massachusetts’s first elementary art teacher. I did that for two years, and then I taught elementary art in Iowa, where my first husband had his first college teaching job. Then we went back to graduate school at Penn State, and I stayed on to teach at Penn State. I also taught first – while I was going to graduate school in the public schools in State College, Pennsylvania. I just always knew I wanted to be a part – that I wanted art to be a major part of my life. And it was, and I would do it again.

Galen Koch: [00:33:57] That’s great. You were teaching at Mass Art for many years, I understand.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:34:02] I taught at Mass Art for the last twenty years of my forty-one-year teaching career. When I came back to Mass Art, I already had been away, I think, for twenty-two years, something like that.

Galen Koch: [00:34:21] Wow. And then, after finishing teaching, you had more time, it sounds, to devote to your studio practice.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:34:31] Absolutely. Yes, I know. I was very fortunate that while I was at Mass Art, I had a lot of different art studios. Bill Wyman and I were living in Scituate, Massachusetts, and I had a studio there, and he had a pottery there. But I did sell that house a couple of years after he died and moved into the Boston area because it was easier. At that time, there were artists who had studios all over downtown Boston in old buildings. I kept getting studios and getting kicked out of them when they would renovate them. A good friend of mine and a colleague at Mass Art and I finally joined this group of eighty-one artists who actually bought and developed a building, Brickbottom in Somerville. So, for over thirty years, I’ve had a studio here in this building with my friend Jill, who’s also been to Haystack, Jill Slosburg-Ackerman. I still have that studio, but I also live here now, too. I have another space that I live in. After my late husband passed away, I think it was about eight years ago, a nice loft space came up here one floor above my studio. I sold my house and moved over here, and it’s easier for me. There are elevators, and I have a garage parking space, and I’m one floor away from my studio.

Galen Koch: [00:36:44] That’s living the dream.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:36:48] [laughter] I am. I used to worry when I was teaching that I wouldn’t have enough time after I retired to be a full-time artist because I always worked. I’ve been a full-time artist now for, I don’t know, it’s about since 1994, I think. So, I think it’s about twenty-five years. I have really enjoyed that. It’s been wonderful.

Galen Koch: [00:37:25] I imagine your studio is quite lived in, in a nice way.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:37:32] It’s full of work. I’ve also been really fortunate that Liz has been my assistant for – how many years?

Liz Newman: [00:37:51] It was twenty-four in September.

Galen Koch: [00:37:55] Oh my gosh.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:37:56] She was not my student. I had already retired when I felt I needed a part-time assistant. I talked to my colleague at Mass Art, and asked her if she could recommend someone who might be interested in working for me part-time. She recommended Liz. I don’t think that Liz or myself ever thought that this would last a long time. It was something that I wanted to try. She’s still here. She comes down; she lives in Kittery, Maine. She comes down once a week.

Galen Koch: [00:38:47] Wow. I’m in Portland, Maine. We’re not far away.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:38:56] [laughter] She comes down one day a week. She’s worked for me for like ten hours a week for all this time. She takes work home, too, because she does some sewing for me. I would not be able to do as ambitious work as I’ve been doing without her help. There’s no way. She’s been an invaluable help to me.

Galen Koch: [00:39:25] That’s wonderful.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:39:27] She helps with everything.

Galen Koch: [00:39:29] That’s great. I have a few more Haystack questions, but I’m just curious if you have any career highlights from the past – what is it? – thirty years that you’ve been retired? My goodness. Not retired  – that you’ve been working as an artist.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:39:52] Oh, yeah. No, I’ve had a lot of – I’ve had some awards, which started, I think, with that award from the National Endowment for the Arts. I also had been in a lot of national and some international shows. Since I’ve been retired, I’ve taught some workshops. I taught a really interesting weekend workshop for the Renwick Alliance in Washington. I just heard – they haven’t even announced it yet – that I’m going to be one of what they call – they award, I think, four craftsmen, probably in four different areas, what they call a Master of the Medium Award every year. I’m getting one of those in 2024, so that will be nice. But also, I had that retrospective show at the Fuller Museum, and my work has been included in a lot of different places. Currently, my work is in an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.  One highlight was I had a piece in a show in Poland at one point, and I actually went there with a group. There was a group called Friends of Fiber at that time. I went to Poland that year and saw the show. It was in a place called Lodz, which had a big textile history and a big textile museum. I think they still have shows there. So, that was a highlight, too. I’ve been in a lot of exhibitions that have been highlights. I showed also at Snyderman-Works Gallery for many years in Philadelphia, and that was always special. Am I missing anything? I guess that’s some of them. But a lot has happened overall.

Galen Koch: [00:42:23] That’s great. What do you remember –? So one thing you went to that’s kind of unusual at Haystack is you went to one of the conferences. Do you remember that?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:42:34] Yes. Well, the most recent one that I went to, which was just a few years ago, was the one, I guess, in –

Galen Koch: [00:42:43] 2019, I think.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:42:47] I went to that with – actually, I went up there with Ferne, who came from California, and she went to it, and my friend Jill, who I share a studio with. The three of us went. That was a really interesting conference. There were a lot of curators as well as craftspeople there. I met interesting people. In fact, the show that I had at the Fuller [Craft] Museum came out of meeting one of the women who was at that conference who was – was she the director at the time? Anyway, they came to my studio afterward. That show grew out of that conference. I met some of the curators there. It was a really interesting conference about what was happening in crafts and where it was going.

Galen Koch: [00:44:06] That’s amazing that that came out of that.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:44:09] Yes. Right. So, that was good. [laughter]

Galen Koch: [00:44:13] Yeah, that sounds great. Marilyn, when you tell people about Haystack, what do you say? How would you describe it? Or why is it important to you?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:44:27] I think it’s a marvelous place for craftsmen, especially to meet other craftsmen in a beautiful, magical setting. There’s a lot of group activities that happen, good food, and an opportunity to work in your area or crossover to another area. I think it’s a really special place to go in the summer. If you can do it, do it, or teach there, or whatever.

Galen Koch: [00:45:17] When you were an educator, even now, maybe this might be true, but I think of being an educator for so long, did you encourage students to go to places like Haystack and Penland? How did the craft school fit in the institutional culture?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:45:39] Well, we always encouraged students to go there, definitely. Mass Art took a trip there every fall, with a lot of students – did you go there, Liz?

Liz Newman: [00:45:53] Oh, yeah. I’ve never forgotten it.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:45:56] Yeah, right.

Liz Newman: [00:45:57] Never forgotten it. It’s a beautiful –

Marilyn Pappas: [00:45:59] It introduced a lot of students, but you didn’t go back for a session, did you?

Liz Newman: [00:46:05] No.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:46:05] No, but a lot of students did. Also, after Bill Wyman died, we established – well, this one man from Washington – Charlie Gailiss was his name. He was at that session, that Paolo Soleri session. I think he died not too long ago. Before he died, he called me and said he’d like to establish some kind of a scholarship in Bill’s name at Mass Art. He did. It was a scholarship for Mass Art ceramics student to go to a Haystack session.

Galen Koch: [00:47:16] As you’re talking – my dad actually worked at Haystack for a long time, and I was texting him because I think. Was it Charlie or something?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:47:31] Charlie Gailiss was a great Haystack supporter. So, there is a scholarship every year from Mass Art in ceramics to go to Haystack for a session, and that’s wonderful. I donated Bill Wyman’s library to Haystack, too, when he died. I mean, those books are old now, but they may still be in a library. I don’t know. I mean, that was 1980, so that was a long time ago.

Galen Koch: [00:48:14] Well, it sounds like it was a very special place to him as well as to you.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:48:19] It was because Bill Wyman had been teaching there in the early years before it even went to Deer Isle.

Galen Koch: [00:48:32] Do you have any favorite memories or stories from Haystack that have [been] stirred up as we’ve been talking?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:48:43] Let me think. Oh, maybe I’ve told you the ones I’ve had, although, during that first time there, it was a pretty interesting time. We also did things like we had movement sessions on the deck. I think there were pictures of that somewhere. Actually, I know there was a slide. I think Bill Wyman and I were both in it moving around. This was 1971. I also learned to stand on my head that summer at Haystack. I remember one night a group of us, not the whole session, but a group of us went to – there was a very local lobster restaurant. We went over there for dinner. I remember they were very slow, and we all got up, and we set the table. [laughter] We just sort of took over, and we just did a lot of things like that that were really fun. It was a great group. I’m just trying to remember other things.

Galen Koch: [00:50:29] Was the island itself, Deer Isle and Stonington, a different place back then?

Marilyn Pappas: [00:50:38] It was not as much developed as it is now. It was pretty far from everything. I mean, Stonington was there, Deer Isle was there, and Blue Hill was there. Well, Blue Hill was pretty much a community. Stonington had a sardine factory then. I remember actually we went on a tour of the sardine factory. Oh, that was another special thing we did. We did all these crazy things. Yeah, that was right there on the coast of Stonington.

Galen Koch: [00:51:36] That’s pretty amazing that you saw that.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:51:41] We went through it and got samples, and there were a lot of women there working, and it lasted a while longer, I think.

Galen Koch: [00:51:56] Yeah. That’s wonderful. Well, Marilyn, thank you so much. If memories get stirred after we talk, and you have some things you want to share, I may contact you if I have anything I want to follow up on, if that’s okay.

Marilyn Pappas: [00:52:16] Yeah, that’s fine.