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La Jolla artist Maire Scharpegge's journey
from communism to success
Learn to swim” is both Maire Scharpegge’s motto in life and the advice she gives to friends and acquaintances who seek to attain the success she has had since she immigrated to the United States from the former East Germany 10 years ago. The La Jolla-based artist and photographer, born and raised in and around Berlin and now 39, doesn’t really mean “learn to swim” in a literal sense. But it’s an apt analogy for getting ahead in life for Scharpegge, who was a champion swimmer as a child in a communist country that had a reputation for being fiercely competitive when it came to athletics.
The water analogy extends to Scharpegge’s artwork, a portion of which is on display now at the world-famous, perched-above-the-ocean restaurant George’s at the Cove in La Jolla. She calls this art form “Metalchemy,” which she describes as the alchemy created by combining photographs of water with reflective metals. The photography in the collection at George’s is taken from above and below the water surface. “By transferring the images onto special metal surfaces,” she explains, “a distinctive glow is created that cannot be captured with traditionally printed photography.
Many of the images are recognizable, incorporating familiar shapes and forms, while others will be unfamiliar with completely random patterns.”
“Fascinated by nature, I have always been captivated by patterns found in nature,” she continues. “Having been an active swimmer for years, I am drawn to water. Water is life! My images are meant to showcase the relationship between the greatest source of life, water, and light reflecting onto life in its variations.”
Scharpegge also works as a freelance digital artist. She is a master at retouching photos, a skill that she likens to “painting on the monitor.” Her clients include Dream Communications, the parent company of Dream Villager and Dream Homes San Diego, and Moebius Digital Color, a company based in the Miramar area of San Diego that specializes in large-scale graphics.
Peter Moebius, co-owner of the business, is Scharpegge’s long-time boyfriend. The two met when Peter delivered a work order to Dream Communications. She names him one of the most inspirational people in her life. However, the man who has influenced her most – “my role model,” she says – is her father. A passionate student of psychology, he has always been there to offer advice to Scharpegge when she asks for it and to help her understand herself better.
The child Maire
Growing up, Scharpegge often felt sorry for her father. While his predilection was clearly psychology, one works where one is needed in a communist country. Her father was given a military-related job that had nothing to do with psychology. As sad as this makes the former country sound, Scharpegge says growing up there played a huge role in who she is and how far she’s come.
Her parents divorced when she was a child, and Scharpegge lived with her mother and stepfather, who were usually too busy to give her the attention she craved. It was in this period that Scharpegge got serious about competitive swimming. For six years, she was in the pool every day and she won first place after first place. “I did that because I needed the freaking love!” she says now with a laugh. In addition, it taught her to toughen up in every aspect of her life.
When it came time to enter the German equivalent of the seventh grade, Scharpegge was invited to attend an “elite” school that specialized in turning out world-class Olympics-bound swimmers. Fortunately, Scharpegge’s mother let her decide between the elite school and regular school. She chose the latter. “I felt that the elite school put swimming above every other part of an education and I wanted to be more learned,” Scharpegge says.
Not too long ago, while here in America, Scharpegge heard about a swimming scandal that happened in East Germany when she was a child. A male coach was impregnating his female swimmers, believing that the increased hormonal levels in the first three months of pregnancy give females more energy and endurance. The plan was for the girls to abort their pregnancies at the end of the first trimester. “That will give you a taste of organized sports in the Eastern Bloc back then,” she says grimly.
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Behind the lens
In 1986, her father presented her with a camera. “It was the greatest gift I ever received,” Scharpegge says. She was interning at Neues Deutschland, at the time the official party newspaper of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany which governed East Germany, to become a reproduction photographer. There is no creativity involved in this kind of work, she says. It is purely technical…you are just trying to exactly copy someone else’s photograph. Frustrated artistically, Scharpegge started to express herself photographically on her own time.
She photographed her way through several years of change from portraying economic situations in Poland in1986, to documenting the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, to capturing lifestyle contrasts in Spain in 1990, to landscape photography.
When the Wall fell, Scharpegge’s father suddenly had no job because there was no longer an East German military. Scharpegge’s father was able to fall back to his first love, psychology.
Happily, in the reunited Germany, he now works as a counselor and consultant for the German department of motor vehicles. His clients are people who have been convicted of driving under the influence, an offense that is far more serious in Germany than it is in the U.S. Not all of Scharpegge’s East German friends and acquaintances, however, took to the new reunified life. In fact, many were bitter that they didn’t have what it takes to thrive in a capitalist society. They couldn’t compete with their Western counterparts in the working world and many found themselves in jobs that were menial or otherwise far below the work they did in East Germany before the two countries came together again.
In a communist country, everyone is protected equally, Scharpegge explains. “Because of that, there is no incentive, no motivation for advancing in your work. It’s stagnating.”
And this is where Scharpegge’s “learn to swim” motto comes in. That’s what she tells disgruntled East German friends when she goes home to visit. She tells them to stop complaining and teaches them how to “swim,” how to get ahead just like the competition – in this case, the West Germans.
Photo courtesy of the Port of San Diego
Obviously, Scharpegge learned to do that herself, first in the newly reunified Germany and then in the United States, even though it took her years to get here. There were endless documents and permissions to obtain and, in order to be accepted at an American university, she had to learn English. While West German children were taught English in their schools, East German students were required to learn Russian instead.
Scharpegge came to the U.S. because she was curious about our country and because she had the “grass is greener on the other side” attitude. When asked why she chose the United States and not France or Britain for example, she smiles and says, “I have always reached for the highest star.” She applied to a handful of colleges in Southern California and the San Francisco Bay Area. San Diego State University accepted her. Scharpegge later found out that one of the graphic arts professors who had reviewed her application remarked to the others, “Let’s get her over here. I’ll bet she has some great stories.”
When she did get here to earn a graduate degree in communications and graphic arts, that same professor immediately gave her an assignment to make a mock model of the Berlin Wall. He wanted all of the details – barbed wire plus graffiti that covered the west side and the blank gray wall on the other side. Scharpegge incorporated her own detail – a photo of a couple and their child peering through the wall, peering at reality.
When she began her studies in the U.S., she came on a student visa and then later obtained an intern visa. Now, with a “Permanent Resident” status she can stay in the U.S. Scharpegge remembers that not too long after she arrived in the U.S. she spent time basking in the San Diego sunshine on a rare Santa Ana Christmas Eve day. “That’s when I decided,” she said, “that I will never live anywhere else. San Diego and the good life have inspired me enough to reflect my story in my art.”
Jacqueline Shannon is a San Diego-based journalist and author. Her 16 books include Why It’s Great to be a Girl (HarperCollins) and Raising a Star (St. Martin’s Press) |