by Kay Teer, Curator Burroughs-Chapin Art Museum
The surrealist, Mary LaRue Wells, is an artist who has made her mark with a well-established career. Wells secured an undergraduate degree in Fine Arts from the University of Washington. While pursuing graduate studies there, she was an instructor of Art at the Seattle campus. Years of travel followed with her husband, a career officer in the US Army. Multiple family responsibilities never quelled her passion to paint, and as a result Wells has created hundreds of oils and acrylics.
Wells paints from an inner landscape while seeing the world from an artistic, surrealistic perspective and a whimsical twist on reality. Her life is full of situations, people and interactions that she comprehends and absorbs in a myriad of ways transcribing them into her paintings.
After years of living in the Washinton D.C. area, Wells now resides and paints in Scottsdale, AZ. Wells has a long history of showing her work coast to coast. Her galleries included Gallery K in Washington D.C., Atelier A/E in New York City and Moonshell Gallery on Hilton Head Island. She also has had numerous one-person shows including The National Wildlife Federation and The US
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"Mary LaRue Wells' very original work defies further description."
- D. T., Dean of Corcoran School of Art -
"Mary LaRue Wells is not a nice person. Lose your cool or let down your
guard or do something weird in her presence, and the next thing you know
your up there in one of her paintings, front and center or tucked away in a
corner looking all strange and odd -- wriggling, struggling, unable to get
off -- there for all eternity."
- The Restonian Magazine -
"The collection of whimsical cat "portraits" by Mary LaRue Wells could only
have been created by one who knows and appreciates the seductive feline
personality. Her technique, a fascinating mixture of acrylic and collage,
integrates fabrics and papers of intricate motifs and patterns into painted
areas of the work. The playful puss becomes both separate from yet a part of
the sinuous design - a blend of humor and fantasy that stimulates the viewer
to look twice to discover something new at every glance."
- N.A., Art Critic -
"Mary Larue Wells' paintings chased all my other paintings out of the room."
- J. P., Collector -
"Mary Wells is known for mixing things up, from placing paper and old photographs in paintings of trees to creating pictures of animals playing dress up. Take one perspective, turn it upside down or inside out and there might be something this witty artist sees worth wrapping her brush around. Her minds been working this way for 70 years and she still is feisty as ever. When asked why a girl riding a pig in her painting is holding a stick with a matching pig on it, she replied, "Well why not?" Her work is what it is; clever sometimes sarcastic and never dull. Never dull."
- Neighbor and Art Critic -
"Mary LaRue Wells' paintings continue to surprise those who have followed her work through the years. Each piece has a unique slant and every subject has its own character."
- Patsy Gilbert, Abstract Artist -