Free Form Painting

​Mara is a Portland, OR-based artist working in paint and pastel. Her practice is fueled by a desire to offer viewers engagement with the evocative qualities of color, shape, and texture. ​ After growing up in the rural mountains of North Carolina and earning a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design, Mara moved to Los Angeles and began her professional art practice. Since that time, her work has been included in group shows in New York and Los Angeles, acquired by private collectors, and sold by interior design-focused retailers. Mara describes her heavily-layered oil paintings as occupying the space between abstract expressionism and color-field painting. She sees each as an invitation into a freely-associative experience—one she intends open the door to interpretation and reflection, in an ever-evolving conversation between artwork and viewer.