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Mary Ahern Artist

My Art Starts in the Garden

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Category Archives: Blog Posts

Lifelong Learning: A Personal Journey

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on October 27, 2024 by Mary AhernOctober 27, 2024
Seth Godin. Akimbo

Screenshot of one of the online Seth Godin & Bernadette Jiwa Akimbo courses I took with other students around the world. It’s a great way to meet others interested in the same things as you.

I’m in my 70s and very excited since I’m back at school and taking a new class. We are so lucky now that there are many ways to continue learning. We can take classes in traditional in-person settings, take online workshops, or pursue a hybrid balance. What a gift!

My pursuit of knowledge has always been eclectic. I study what I want, when I want or need it, to enhance the projects I’m working on. Not one to seek the traditional BA, MA, or PhD stepping stones, I followed the song made famous by Frank Sinatra, I did it “My Way.”

One of the constants in my life is that I’m always studying something. A deep and wide curiosity leads me to focus on personal growth and practical knowledge — from Maharishi to computer programming and everything in between.

Many online classes over the years have allowed me to study subjects like digital painting, oils, watercolor, illustration, and abstraction. These online classes let me experiment quickly with various mediums and styles to see if they are something I might want to study more deeply. I remember taking an online workshop with an artist and then flying from NY to Baton Rouge to study in his in-person workshops. This would never have happened had I not met him and his work online. Both the online and in-person types of study are unique experiences in their way, and at times, one leads to the other.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE.

Originally published in Sanctuary Magazine. 

Tagged Art Blog | Leave a reply

Women Helping Women: A Recipe for Success -Art Blog

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on August 31, 2024 by Mary AhernAugust 31, 2024

There were women who stepped into my life’s journey that changed the course of my life at critical junctures that I only realized in hindsight. I was raised in a very conventional household by strict European parents with very defined roles. By twenty years of age, I’d come to the pinnacle of my success with my prince charming of a hubby, a baby, and our own home. What a relief! I had it all. The American dream. Contentment personified.

Two Women Friends

Mary (L) and Roberta ~ 1977 Photo Courtesy: Mary Ahern

Until my beloved hubby rocked our little world by wanting out of our paradise. I had no life preparation beyond anything except the happy home, two sons, a dog, and a white picket fence. I didn’t know any woman who worked, let alone was raising their children by herself. I honestly imagined my sons, and I would starve to death without a man to work and earn the money to use in the supermarket. The windows in our home became a prison to me, keeping us silently and painfully apart from the world. My dark hopelessness led me on frightening trails of despair and death.

The emergency slowly passed. Life settled down a bit. But I was changed forever. I knew I needed to control the outcome of life for my sons and me. Then, I met Roberta at the YMCA Swim and Gym classes for our three-year-olds. She was a biology professor at Queen College and showed me I could get educated. Because of her, I went to college, got my degree in fine arts, and then got my divorce on my terms.

With confidence and a goal, I got a job at Barnard College, the women’s college of Columbia University, a bastion of feminism—an entirely new world of supportive women who opened up a vast world for me. Martha hired me as the office manager since, as she said, any single mother knows how to balance time and tasks. Since classes were free for employees, I studied programming in the School of Engineering, and Martha encouraged me to get into the then nascent field of computers. She also said to follow where a company makes its money, so I should go into sales or finance for my career. I took her advice.

Mary’s Office Just After Starting Her Own Business, Online Design (1995)
Photo Courtesy: Mary Ahern

Mary Ann had a Datsun 280 sports car, wore gold jewelry, and owned expensive houses. She showed me women on their own can be wealthy. I determined that if I couldn’t be home at 3 o’clock with the milk and cookies, I would make the most money I possibly could. She showed me it was possible.

I went into the sales field in the male-dominated computer graphics industry since there I would earn money based upon my own efforts while combining my art, graphics, and computer backgrounds. And I did. Until I hit my head on the glass ceiling. So, I started my own graphic design/marketing business.

As an entrepreneur, I controlled how I used my time, benefited financially from my own skills and efforts, chose the types of work that intrigued me and created and designed my own lifestyle.

And now is my time in my journey; I get to pay it forward. Using the models, the women before so wisely gave me, I am able to generously offer my experience to other women. Being an active member of the National Association of Women Artists (NAWA), I am in a position to share my business experience in sales and marketing with many other women to help them move along in their own journeys. Like having a delicious piece of apple pie with a scoop of ice cream and a cherry on top at the end of an exquisite meal, I’m finally having my dessert.

NAWA has been empowering women artists for 135 years as the first women’s professional art organization founded in the US. Like the women who helped me in my life’s journey, I’m comforted by knowing I’m also helping other women in theirs. As Isaac Newton said: “…if I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.”

My life is filled with gratitude for what I have experienced and learned throughout my life, and that I now have an opportunity to share with other women in my community of professional women artists. Life is sweet!

National Association of Women Artists (NAWA) 2023 New Member Induction Ceremony
Mary (Bottom Row, 4th from Right)
Photo Courtesy: Mary Ahern. Chair of Public Relations Committee


Originally published in Sanctuary Magazine March 2024

Tagged Art Blog, NAWA | Leave a reply

Art Blog Post: A Virtual Visitor Had Me Contemplating My Lifelong Career in the Arts

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on August 19, 2024 by Mary AhernAugust 19, 2024
Judy Chicago

Photo of Judy Chicago  by Donald Woodman

A Virtual Visitor Had Me Contemplating My Lifelong Career in the Arts

To read this on the Art Blog click here!

https://www.maryahernartist.com/art-blog/virtual-visitor/

A short while ago I had a virtual visitor enter my studio while I was standing at my easel working on an oil painting. The visitor was Judy Chicago who was interviewed for the 60-year retrospective of her work at the New Museum in New York. Out of the corner of my eye, as I continued to paint, I watched and listened to the live-streaming event for the exhibition “Herstory” (here’s the YouTube Video of the event) which was the first comprehensive museum survey of her work. Judy Chicago was born in 1939 and as I listened to this interview it was 2023. Eighty-four years is a long, long time to wait to have this type of recognition.

This juxtaposition of Judy being live-streamed into my studio as I painted was profound for me since Judy’s work and those of many other women artists whom I was fortunate enough to be made aware of during the 1970’s when I was majoring in art in college, are why I’m still creating my work. These women artists weren’t in my textbooks. They were instead presented to me by some of the women art historians and women professors I studied with when I was lucky enough to attend classes at the then, tuition-free, City University of NY. All these women changed my life. The women artists were showing a new way of working and the professors were exposing us to a reevaluation of the art historical canon.

Mary Ahern Painting “Passion – Red Dahlia” Oil on Canvas 30×30″  

I first saw Judy’s work in 1979 as thousands of us made a pilgrimage to the Brooklyn Museum of Art to view The Dinner Party. This groundbreaking installation was created with Judy’s vision and also the efforts of hundreds of women offering their skills in various mediums. This work helped to introduce fabrics, embroidery, stitching, ceramics and various other techniques which had been ungraciously removed from the category of “Fine Art” by those who were in charge of writing the history of art. These creative skills were those exercised primarily by women and now were finally being presented in museums.

We stood for what seemed like hours, quietly waiting for our turn to enter the site-specific art in the room which housed the installation. Most of us on the long line had dressed in better than everyday wear for the occasion. When we finally reached the doorway, we found the room lights were dimmed. We entered as if entering a house of worship. Voices were hushed. Many folded their hands as if in prayer. It was the closest I’d come to a sacred event outside of an actual house of worship. We all knew this was a pivotal point in our lives. Our eyes and minds were to be opened to entirely new languages, visuals and histories that we’d never encountered before in the mainstream art world. Upon emerging from this immersive experience, we were elated, buoyant, excited beyond imagination by the possibilities we’d just been introduced to. We were sure that now everything would be different. We knew it had to be.

Upon reading Judy’s recent book, The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago”, I learned how hard a life she had bringing her visions to fruition and acceptance. She and her work were torn apart, reviled, and denigrated by the conventional art world. The press denounced her vision and the work of the women artists who contributed their skills. Reading about her hard-fought lifetime of bringing her art into the world, reminded me that all of us have obstacles in our lives. They vary from person to person. But to be a creative artist for an entire lifetime takes a certain amount of grit. Success, by whatever measurement we use, takes the ability to keep pushing forward through the hard times. The times your heart is breaking. The times you are having trouble putting food on the table. The times your family is in crisis. The times you feel less than because others feel so much more than.

Because of these feminist artist pioneers, I’m still painting, still creating, still growing. They cleared the path and showed me the way. And as I stood at my easel painting, Judy streamed in to tell me to keep going, there’s no quitting, there’s no calendar, there’s no promise, no destination. I’ll just keep making my art. She still is.

Photo collage by Mary Ahern


 

Posted in Art Blog, Blog Posts | Tagged Art Blog, Inspiration | Leave a reply

Oh Dear, I Now Have Deer

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on March 21, 2024 by Mary AhernMarch 21, 2024

I first noticed it in the fall. Something had eaten my hostas. My usual culprits have been the rabbits, but this was well beyond their usual food shopping spree. Perhaps they decided to invite their entire extended family this time. The raccoons ate all the minnows in my new small pond, so they weren’t hungry either. So I decided to install Ring cameras to see who was having a party in my garden while I innocently slept.

And there he was, a huge antlered deer. Oh Dear!
Daytime Deer Spotting

Daytime Deer in my Garden. I don’t know who was more scared, him or me.

The next day, I bought a battery-operated sprayer and researched what would work best to preserve my precious garden. Most of the products not only smelled bad enough to ward off the deer, but they also smelled bad enough to keep me out of the garden as well. I found one brand that also contained some mint, which apparently the deer hate, so that’s the one I settled on. So last fall, after every rainy day, I would head out to spray the perimeter of my garden. This year, I’m upping my game since the buck brought his harem and extended family.

Deer in the Front Garden

In the front garden this deer ate all my hostas in one sitting. I was wondering if he was going to ask for some salad dressing.

I’m having deer fencing installed in the part of the garden where they most frequently gain entrance in the hopes of diverting their attention. This happened to be on the property line with my new neighbor. Using the markings he had in position from his recent surveying, together we agreed on the exact placement of my upcoming fence. I hung screaming yellow Caution tape to define the property line, which sure disturbs the calming woodland aesthetics I’ve been creating for the last 35 years. The next step was the installation of this one section of fencing, knowing full well that it was only the beginning of preserving my garden sanctuary.

Deer Fencing

This is the view from my neighbors side of the deer fencing which I had installed on our mutual property line. I sure hope the deer notice it.

 

You can read more articles about my garden on my dedicated Garden Blog: The Garden Artist.


 

Tagged Garden News | 1 Reply

Trimming Hellebores. My First Gardening Task of the Spring

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on February 29, 2024 by Mary AhernFebruary 29, 2024
That first sunny warm day in February seduces me into my garden to begin my spring gardening tasks before the last snowstorms of winter reappear for a brief visit. It is a happy day for me each year when I reach for my Felco’s, put on my gardening gloves, pick up my rake and head out to reunite with my garden.
February Hellebores ready for trimming. Mary Ahern

February Hellebores ready for trimming. Mary Ahern

READ MORE ABOUT TRIMMING HELLEBORES HERE


 

Posted in Garden Blog, NEWS | Tagged Garden News | Leave a reply

I Met A Hero of Mine – Audrey Flack

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on February 2, 2024 by Mary AhernFebruary 2, 2024
Audrey Flack

Audrey Flack at the Southampton Arts Center, November 2023 Photo credit: James F Dawson

Audrey Flack is a painter who, when I was in college in the 1970s, inspired me as I began my artistic journey. My art history teacher Patricia Hills at York College, which is part of the City University of New York (CUNY) system, introduced us to the many women artists who were pushing the envelope at the time. There was Audrey Flack, Joyce Kozloff and Judy Chicago. All of these women are currently Honorary Vice Presidents of the National Association of Women Artists. Since at the moment, I am Chair of the Public Relations Committee of NAWA it is such an honor to be meeting these artists who are still teaching us to keep working, keep pushing, and keep making our own artistic statements.

Recently I went with hubby Dave and my friends Susan Rostan & hubby Bob to the “Heroines of Abstract Expressionism” at the Southampton Arts Center here on Long Island. Audrey had work in the show but so did four other artists who had been members of NAWA, Louise Nevelson, Nell Blaine, Dorothy Dehner, and Buffie Johnson.

Since Susan and I are co-hosting the Historical Research Team at NAWA this was an auspicious occasion for us and opened up new opportunities for research and writing.

2023-11-12-Roz-Dimon-Audrey-Flack-Mary-Ahern-Susan-Rostan4-20x72

NAWA artists: Roz Dimon, Audrey Flack, Mary Ahern, Susan Rostan at the Southampton Arts Center, November 2023 Photo credit: James F Dawson

Then another amazing event happened, Audrey Flack was scheduled for a talk at Southampton two weeks later, so we signed up and took another drive out east. It sure was worth it! Audrey, who is now 92, was there and clear as a bell answered questions about her work and her experiences from the 1950s onward. She was funny, dished gossip, was fully knowledgeable about the era, the people, the art movements and who the players in the industry were at the time. She talked about the Cedar Bar where all the artists gathered, talked & drank after working in their studios all day. She talked about Jackson Pollack, Robert Motherwell, Clement Greenberg, Helen Frankenthaler, and many more artists and gallerists. In the audience, was a who’s who of the Hamptons Art Scene asking the questions and/or thanking her for her many contributions to the arts.

I’m so grateful to still be able to be working as an artist, that I continue to grow, to enjoy and learn from other artists. To have this “brush with greatness” that I experienced by listening to, speaking to and having my photo taken with one of my heroes sparkles brightly in my life’s journey. I thank Pat Hills for opening my eyes and my mind over 50 years ago to pay attention to these women artists who were clearing the path and showing us that we as women artists had voices and something unique to say. And after all these decades, we still have statements to make, wisdom to share, and paths to plow for others to follow.

READ MORE on the ART BLOG Click here


 

Posted in Art Blog, Art Exhibitions | Tagged Art Blog, Exhibitions, Inspiration, NAWA | Leave a reply

The Start Of My Artistic Journey 50 Years Ago

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on September 17, 2023 by Mary AhernSeptember 17, 2023

My first step towards discovering that my life’s work would be an artistic journey was buying a Jon Gnagy, Learn to Draw set and experiencing a sensation that the charcoal was an extension of my hand, my arm and my body. It was thrilling!

The Original Jon Gnagy, Learn to Draw set

After completing his entire set of drawing lessons, I decided to take painting classes at the local YMCA where I lived at the time in Queens, NY. So, I arranged for a babysitter, signed up for the oil painting class and made my first foray into Jerry’s Artarama art supply store with my supply shopping list in hand. How electrifying to be exposed to so many wonderful and exciting new products, widgets, thingies, colors, brushes, papers and canvas. Oh, the possibilities!

READ MORE on The Art Blog


 

Posted in Art Blog, NEWS | Tagged Art Blog | Leave a reply

New Garden Blog Post – The Woodland Garden Reveals

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on August 7, 2023 by Mary AhernAugust 7, 2023

My idea of the garden I wanted to create around my new home when I bought it in 1989, was a place to immerse myself, not a garden to be admired while sitting on the deck. I had no particular plan that I imagined. Instead, I let the woodland speak to me.

This woodland was filled with poison ivy, invasive vines, thorns and many broken branches and limbs when it called to me. Together for over three decades, it and I have worked to create a woodland garden for meditation. This is the journey.

 

READ MORE…

Posted in Art Blog, Blog Posts, Garden Blog | Tagged Garden News | Leave a reply

Art Blog Post – This Artist’s Dilemma. Storage.

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on July 12, 2023 by Mary AhernSeptember 17, 2023

So I’m standing in my studio basking in the golden warmth of just having completed my one month Solo Exhibition which filled three rooms in an historic mansion at the Bayard Cutting Arboretum. I’d worked for years creating new work for this prestigious opportunity. And now the show was over, the work still owned by me was taken down from the walls, packaged protectively and transported to my home studio. I looked around me surrounded by all this new artwork. I remembered the journey of discovery as so many new ideas had begun to seep into my new work over time.

As I stood there looking around me with contentment at these 40 new artworks, a cold wave of concern trickled into my mind. Where would I put all my art? I’m a minimalist by nature. I can’t stand clutter and now every surface in my two room studio is covered with piles of work. Canvases are stacked, leaning against the walls. All the walls in my studio and home are already full. A sense of claustrophobia was rapidly taking hold. The warm glow I’d been feeling turned a cold blue.

I needed to immediately take action.

READ MORE!

 

Posted in Art Blog, Artwork | Tagged About the Art | Leave a reply

Garden Blog Post – Overwintering My Summer Tropical Garden

Mary Ahern Artist Posted on June 21, 2023 by Mary AhernAugust 7, 2023

Overwintering My Summer Tropical Garden is now posted on my garden blog.

I wrote about how I converted my darkroom into a plant room with sinks, counters and LED lighting.. I show a four month sequence of photos from my plant room to the deck where the plants spend their summer vacation.

Read more here..

June 6, 2023 Deck Plantings

Read about how I overwinter my tropical garden on my Garden Blog Here.

Posted in Garden Blog, NEWS | Tagged Garden News | Leave a reply

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