Artist known for oversized papier mache

The enormous, brightly colored papier maché toadstool mushroom caps all over Nancy Roberts’ dining room are not an unusual sight.

Such fantastical sculptures are a common in the home of this Kalispell artist.

Roberts, 57, almost quit creating art for good after a high school art teacher told her she would amount to nothing, remarking on a mobile she had made called “Flight of Fantasy,” a project she was proud of.

“To me art is very subjective; it’s what you envision,” Roberts said. “I guess I marched to the beat of a different drum. Because she said I would never amount to anything, for 23 years I didn’t pick up a palette at all. I believed her.”

But there was that fateful day that allowed her to believe in her art again. She picked up a rock, painted it to look like a cat and placed it on a chair.

“My father-in-law thought it was a real cat and almost sat on it,” Roberts said with a laugh.

To envision a three-dimensional sculpture, Roberts sketches her idea out on graph paper before building an infrastructure out of materials such as cardboard, chicken wire, rebar, newspaper, masking tape or Styrofoam.

“You get lost in your own thoughts and suddenly 10 hours have gone by,” Roberts said about the process.

Roberts’ sculptures would become bigger and bigger, surpassing 10 feet. Her former house on Fifth Avenue West North was the place to stop on Halloween because of the elaborate papier maché decorations. She has also made creations for friends’ parties and props for theater productions. Whitefish Theatre Co. is among the entities that have benefited from Roberts’ artistic ability.

Her art has had such an impact on people it may have stopped one person from drinking alcohol, Roberts said. One of her favorite pieces, a papier maché reproduction of Buckbeak, is from the Harry Potter books. It was commissioned for display at a local bookstore’s Harry Potter book releases. Buckbeak is a mythical “hippogriff,” half horse and half eagle.

“I was out in the garage 2 a.m. one morning. I had the light on and people could see in, but I couldn’t see out. I heard someone walk down the alley and was working on Buckbeak’s wings. I was talking to him — I talk to my pieces — the guy, just his way of walking I knew he was drinking. All of a sudden, I heard the footsteps stop. I kept talking. I don’t know if he looked at Buckbeak in the eye, but all of a sudden this guy dropped a bottle and ran down the rest of the alley.”

Other than that event, her easygoing personality and penchant for humor puts people at ease. She attributes this to her parents.

“My dad could always laugh at things. I think he taught me to see the bright side of life and he was so smart — the valedictorian of his high school and college classes. He was a ceramic engineer,” Roberts said.

As a young girl her parents always encouraged her to explore her interests, no matter how unconventional, such as taxidermy. In junior high Roberts was fascinated with the preserved animals on display during a visit to The Field Museum in Chicago.

“I was going around seeing how they had put them together trying to find the seam,” Roberts said. She attempted the hobby.

“I loved animals. I thought I would like to learn how to stuff them. I sent off for a correspondence course. I would get these little lesson plans and have people find dead animals for me,” Roberts said. “Our refrigerator downstairs was always full of dead animals.”

She couldn’t continue after witnessing her mother’s best friend kill a rooster for her to practice taxidermy.

“She wrung its neck and just said ‘this is how we used to kill them on the farm.’ I cried for ages. I wrapped it in paper, put it in the freezer, never to be opened again.”

The real tipping point was after a blackout caused the electricity to go out. Ice cream melted over a three-pound bass.

“We ended up throwing everything out,” Roberts said. “I got over taxidermy in a year.”

In addition to hobbies, Roberts is not shy about trying new things career-wise. While she now teaches nutrition to first-, third- and fifth-graders in area schools through the Montana State University Extension Service and cooking classes at the Community Action Partnership of Northwest Montana, her first job was as a soda jerk at a place called Kables Dairy in Mexico, Mo.

“I was 15 years old. I sold milk products, made malts and shakes,” Roberts said. “I got a dollar an hour.”

Family has been a big part of her life. She’s married to Geoff Roberts and has three grown children, Devon Olson, 27; Justin Olson, 37 and Nicole Poindexter, 35.

In the 1980s she undertook a number of different jobs, including stints as a nursing home activity director, security guard and public safety police officer.

“I could fill a whole book with what I’ve done,” Roberts said, grinning.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or by email at hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.