About Mary

The through-line connecting all of my work is a wish to understand the back-and-forth relationship between artworks and viewers: How we engage with the world around us, whether that is a public space or a sculpture held in the hand.

My art practice consists of two interconnected parts:
public art projects and independent studio work.

I currently live in Phoenix, Arizona.

 
 

My public projects invite people to see our public spaces from different perspectives. My aim is to make our shared spaces more humane through the use of beauty, humor, and human connection.

My projects range from large-scale, permanent artworks to temporary interactive installations, including art incorporated into urban and rural walking and biking trails, public transit stations, college campuses, and neighborhood parks.

My studio work is a realm to explore ideas and materials too personal and fragile for public art. As our culture moves at ever-faster speeds and ever-larger scales, my studio practice is an expression of faith in the enduring value of carefully made, human-scaled craft. The objects I make carry echoes of both the ancient and modern: relics, scientific models, petroglyphs, and logic maps. Working in the ancient craft of cloisonné—a meticulous process where colored glass is kiln-fired between tiny hand-bent wires—connects me to a worldwide lineage of artists who create meaningful objects with our hands.

 

My process for creating cloisonné on electroformed copper