Featured Artist Mary Garrish

Plein air artist Mary Garrish paints the beauty of Florida, creating dreamlike images that capture the light and color of land and sea. To see more, visit her website.

 

 

I came to art unexpectedly and later in life. I quickly found that I had the same work ethic and passion for art that I’d had in my prior career in medicine.

 

 

I wake up filled with enthusiasm each morning, ready to return to the easel and explore the possibilities of what I might create.

 

 

I’ve always loved the great outdoors, so it was with great passion that I began plein air painting. I find my inspiration in plein air and then head back to my studio to create paintings and put my ideas to canvas.

 

 

Not every painting makes it into a frame. In fact, only a small percentage of my creations make the cut. The experimental nature of my process is essential for my growth as an artist.

 

 

Plein air painting has helped me train my eyes to see—to truly see. I couldn’t have trained my eyes to perceive the intimacy of nature scenes through painting from photographs alone.

 

 

Nature is my live model. Early mornings and late afternoons are my favorite times of the day to paint. I find the shadows to be more interesting and the vibrations of light through the atmosphere to be so enticing.

 

 

The pastel shades of a grey day are particularly interesting. As a native Floridian, I’m drawn to the elusive nature of our skies with a curiosity that is unending. I feel as though nature provides us with a thousand different paintings every day in the ever-changing sky.

 

 

Fortunately, I’m also surrounded by water in the form of rivers, lakes and the ocean, which of course change like the wind and provide a myriad of palette choices.

 

 

Winston Churchill once wrote, “Happy are the painters, for they shall not be lonely. Light and colour, peace and hope, will keep them company to the end, or almost to the end of the day.”

 

 

This best describes the immense pleasure that plein air painting has brought into my life!

 

Artist Mary Garrish invites you to follow her on Facebook page and Facebook Profile page, as well as on Instagram and Pinterest.

 

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