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"If one believes that the creative process feeds and is fed by the making of a personal mythology, then the invention of one’s own myth allows the artist to paint out of the deepest recesses of the self..."

- Sharyn R. Udall, from Carr, O’Keefe, Kahlo: Places of Their Own

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My work is a search for what is not immediately evident rather than an imitation of what is there.  I do not start with a “finished” image in mind.  I start with a notion, question, experience or vague memory.   I am a visceral painter and have learned to trust that.

My manipulation of collage elements and layering them with paint and drawing elements lets me react in an immediate way that allows a dialog to begin on the canvas.   The exciting thing for me in working this way is that the work takes on a life of its own; it reveals so much more than I could have ever pre-conceived and it allows me to “see” much deeper.

- Mary Hardy