Mary Anne Arntzen

Mary Anne was born in Riverside, California and lives and works in Baltimore, Maryland. In 2010, she received a Master of Fine Arts from the Maryland Institute college of Art. Notable exhibitions include the Walters Art Museum (Baltimore), The Painting Center (NYC), and Resort Gallery (Baltimore). In addition to her painting practice, Mary Anne is a conservation technician for textiles at the Baltimore Museum of Art. This work has informed her interest in pattern, repetition and color.

Mary Anne's visual vocabulary borrows from architecture, nature, textiles and cartoons. Abstract, organic forms meet the surrounding spaces like puzzle pieces or bodies merging. The forms behave as physical objects; catching light, casting shadows, and weaving through surfaces. Utilizing humor and suspension of disbelief, her paintings reference tromp l'eoil still lives, flat patterns and digital imagery. These elements together create spaces that are simultaneously straight-forward and ambiguous, toeing the line between abstraction and illusionism. Conflicting visual narratives abound as shapes alternately dominate and undermine one another in carefully choreographed chaos.