Off-the-wall art

When Americans hear the word "wallpaper," many may think of The Brady Bunch or bad kitchen designs. \nNama Rococo, a wallpaper company started by IU alums Karen Combs and April Combs Mann, is trying to change all that. \nCombs has been running Nama Rococo for only about a year, but people are already starting to take notice. The company's bold, bright colors and quirky designs have received press in The New York Times, Newsweek and other national publications.\nKaren Combs graduated from IU somewhere around 1981, though she said she can't remember the exact date. \n"It was one of those things where I had a few classes to finish up for a few years before I got the degree," she said in an e-mail. \nHer sister April followed in 1993. Both sisters graduated with a degree in fine arts with a focus on studio art, though April worked mostly with ceramics while Karen specialized in printmaking. After college, the sisters worked odd art-related jobs (between them they have worked with beads, books, bound journals and hats, among other mediums) and relocated from Bloomington to western Massachusetts, where their company is based.\nCombs said the years she spent working with various art projects gradually led her to come up with the idea to start Nama Rococo.\n"All roads kind of led to wallpaper," she said.\nOne of the major reasons Nama Rococo stands out among other wallpaper companies, Combs believes, is the care that goes into each panel of paper. Combs and several assistants hand-paint the background of the wallpaper before a screen-printed foreground is added. Due to the labor intensive process, Nama Rococo wallpaper is significantly more expensive than the traditional, store-bought variety.\n"Karen's wallpaper takes (wallpaper design) to another level," said Nathalie Chapple, a Los Angeles-based designer who used Nama Rococo paper to accent a popular LA bar. "It's not kitsch. It's just really good design, really good color, and it's done beautifully."\nCombs estimated that her paper may cost ten to 20 times what mass-produced paper is sold for, but said that hand-painting gives the paper a touch that is unattainable any other way.\n"It gives a devil-may-care feeling to the work," Combs said of painting the backgrounds by hand. "The tradition of wallpaper is a very uptight, rigid kind of thing, and one of the main things I'm trying to do is break down that rigidness, and open it up and make it a little more playful."\nCaleb Weintraub, an assistant professor in IU's School of Fine Arts said that while many IU students continue to create art after graduation, it's rare to be as commercially successful as Nama Rococo has been.\n"Most people who (graduate from the IU art) program continue to make art but probably few do it in the professional vein," he said. "The market is so slim that it's very hard to make a living on it." \nWeintraub said that IU's painting department places a heavy emphasis on art that can be shown in a gallery, but said hand-painted wallpaper like Nama Rococo's should still be considered an art form.\n"The idea of making hand-painted wallpaper is not artless at all," he said. "Making art that is utilitarian is not anti-art. It doesn't go against the motivation of what painting can be."\nIt seems more people are feeling this way. Combs said that some customers don't even bother covering an entire room with her paper, and that many of them simply buy a small sheet of it to frame as art itself. \n"Whether it's a room or a wall, (Nama Rococo wallpaper) makes a whole artwork, as opposed to having to frame a bunch of art or put up a sculpture or what have you," said Chapple, who added that she will continue using Nama Rococo in future design projects because of the Combs' artistic sensibilities.\nWith all the success they've had, the Combs sisters are ready to expand. April said that they may even begin working with furniture, since both she and Karen have ambitious visions for the future.\n"We always have ideas of what we'll do next, even if we don't know exactly what that is yet," she said.\nIf the past year is any indication, the future looks bright indeed.\nFor more information about Nama Rococo or to view their products, visit www.namarococo.com.