Maker Monday: Tucson artist turns purses and tote bags into colorful desert art

Mackenzie Robb says she’s never met something she didn't want to paint on.

Purses, tote bags, birdhouses, even the occasional pair of sneakers — they’re all canvases for Robb’s vibrant, desert-themed designs.

“Many people think of the desert and think of brown and tan, which I think is still beautiful, but I really want to paint how the Southwest makes me feel,” Robb said. “My art is bright, colorful, and focuses mainly on the colors that I envision of the Southwest.”

Her love of color, and her Arizona home, is evident, not just in her artwork, but in her rainbow-painted nails, turquoise jewelry, and multi-colored outfits. Even her home studio is adorned with rainbow curtains, life-size paintings of javelina, and several of her other dreamy, color-saturated works that capture the ethereal beauty of the desert.

Born and raised in Washington State, Robb said she never expected to fall in love with the desert of Arizona, but found inspiration in the landscape, plants, and animals around Tucson. Many of her pieces feature desert sunsets, blooming cacti, and wildlife like bobcats, burros and javelinas.

Robb originally began painting her artwork on tote bags in her university days, creating custom bags for weddings and sororities. Over the years, she has expanded her art to matted prints, stickers, magnets and some traditional canvas paintings.

“I moved more into canvases because people were interested in original artwork that they could display,” Robb said.

The stickers and magnets in particular, she said, are extremely popular.

“Magnets are usually my best-selling item, just because there are so many designs I've done over the last couple of years, and I've turned almost every single one into a magnet, if possible,” Robb said.

Picking a favorite design out of her extensive collection of work is like trying to pick a favorite child, Robb said, but some that she is particularly fond of are her prickly pear cactus and family of javelinas.

“The original was just a baby, mom and dad. It sort of symbolized my parents and me, because I'm an only child, and I love javelinas,” she said. “I tend to have a favorite place in my heart for them, just because I love Arizona wildlife.”

Of all her work though, Robb said it is her hand-painted purses that she has become known for.

Each bag is a unique, one-of-a-kind piece of wearable art, depicting the desert landscape in Robb’s signature vibrant colors.

“Purses, because of the texture, I can't photograph and turn into a magnet, I can't turn them into a greeting card,” she said.

It all started with a purse she’d found at Target a few years back.

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“It had no design, really, no hardware on it, and I said, ‘I feel like I could do something with this,’” Robb said.

It turned out to be just the first of many, and Robb said she’s now made close to 150 pouches, purses and tote bags, and collects new canvases wherever she can.

“My entire closet here is filled with purses,” she said. “Whether it's finding them secondhand, finding them in thrift stores, finding them at Buffalo Exchange.”

When creating her purse designs, Robb said that most often, she likes to just start painting and see where her inspiration takes her. A single purse can take anywhere from a couple of hours to 10 hours for her to complete depending on the size, and whether she is painting one or both sides.

“Small pouches I can usually do in a couple hours and feel content,” Robb said. “Sometimes purses can take me 10 hours.”

The price of her bags also varies depending on the time spent creating the piece, the size of the item, and the cost of materials, though Robb said she tries to offer some at every price point.

“My pouches start around $25. I try to keep them reasonable for anyone who wants to come into a booth when I do a market,” she said. “My most expensive purse, which was a double-sided, very structured purse — versus being a little bit more slouchy — is upward of $200.”

Most of the time, she said she’s not necessarily making her bags because they sell at markets, or for commissions, but simply because creating them brings her joy.

“A lot of it is creating because I enjoy it, because I have fun with it,” she said. “I want to paint to bring happiness to myself and others around me. So, if that means painting a purse that may sit for months at a market waiting to find its home, I have fun painting it, and I know it's going to find its place eventually.”

If you’re wanting to get your hands on some of her smaller art pieces, you can find her work in any of the three BunBun vending machines around Tucson, as a participating artist in their new “Smol Worx” art show which runs through July.

Robb contributed 36 of her magnets to the show, meant to capture the feeling of summer in Tucson.

“It's my first time participating in one of their vending machines,” Robb said. “I think it'll be cool, not only to see what everybody else does, but to see what being in a vending machine is like.”

“It’s a great way to support artists in an unconventional way,” she said. “So that's going to be really exciting.”