Abundant Acres (40 x 40” oil and acrylic on board)
by Mia Phillips
Looking back on fond memories of painting in Provincetown, one memory in particular stands out to Mary Giammarino. She recalls being in the dunes; she’s alone watching the sun as it sets over the water, taking in the scenery and translating it onto her canvas with paint. She’s basking in the stillness and the silence when she realizes that in the distance, she can hear the seals playing in the ocean. As she paints, she feels herself connecting to the landscape around her, and as the sun is replaced by the moon, she is then inspired to begin painting the moon instead. Reminiscing on this stand-out moment from her career as an artist, she describes it as “incredible.”
Giammarino started her artistic career in college, where she majored in fine art and pursued painting. There she says she learned “how to see, draw, and history.” She cites her teachers and fellow students as inspirations early on in her experience as an artist. Since then, she has used her education to pursue painting using a technique called “en plein air,” which is the act of painting outdoors. This technique requires Mary to have an intimate and personal connection to nature as she spends hours engrossed in the scenes she paints, accounting for all the details many overlook. She says, “Being in nature gives you more of an immediate relationship, not separate from it, being in all of the elements… the painting part of it, the results are better than looking at a photo, you’re getting more the feeling and the light.”
According to Giammarino, choosing a scene to paint comes down to familiarity and intimacy with a scene. She likes to have some personal connection to a scene to feel inspired to paint it. She says, “I think it is like [Charles] Hawthorne said. You have to see it painted in your mind’s eye. That’s the only way I can explain it, like you see it painted in your head…And that is, you know, ultimately, it’s very personal.”
Her favorite place to paint is the dunes; working out in the remote landscape allows her to immerse herself in the environment. She is thankful to the National Seashore for making such scenes accessible and giving her a space to experience nature and wildlife. However, she says she doesn’t just find inspiration in the scenery but in the process as well, saying, “We push ourselves to paint no matter how we’re feeling. It’s more like, the inspiration comes from painting. A lot of us are inspired by what we’re looking at, but we’re more inspired by the process.”
She refers to the weather and the seasons as the “moods of nature,” which inherently influence her paintings. She compares the moods of nature to the moods she experiences in her personal life, saying, “If it was sunny all the time that would be boring.” The changing weather and seasons of the year are necessary for life and nature to maintain the natural continuation of growth. When asked about the moods of nature she says, “When you’re a painter, you’re always aware of what’s going on around you. So, I think all the subtleties of the change in the day in the sky to the moon, to rainy days, cloudy days, winter, it’s always fascinating.”
Being in Provincetown is inspirational for her, not just because of the landscape but the community of artists here as well. She says, “There are so many great painters that it makes me want to be a great painter, too.” It’s the artist community in Provincetown that Giammarino says keeps her coming back year after year, calling it her “home away from home.” She feels grateful for the ability to pursue her art here, saying, “It’s just been a great experience for me.” She also expressed gratitude toward Four Eleven Gallery for the opportunity to show her work there.
Throughout her career as an artist, Giammarino’s style has evolved. She now strives to be more loose, abstract, and expressionistic in her work. She says, “That’s kind of my goal, you know, to be more spontaneous with my art and not just representing the thing but putting a little more of my personal feelings into it.” She has a desire to continue to grow and never stop growing in her art and wants to always be exploring different styles and techniques in her work. Right now, light and color are two elements she is focusing on highlighting in her practice. She says, “Light is such an abstract element you only see on things and what it’s doing to things, so I’m representing that with color.” She also finds inspiration in her love of painting, particularly impressionist painting which is a style that emphasizes an accurate depiction of natural light.
Going forward, Giammarino wants to explore the use of animal subjects in her work to highlight the diverse wildlife that Provincetown has to offer. This includes the foxes and coyotes that can often be seen in Provincetown at dusk. She is excited about the possibilities of incorporating these animals into her art, adding a new dimension to her already rich and vibrant works.
Mary Giammarino’s new work will be on display in an exhibition called Songs in the Key of Light at Four Eleven Gallery, 411 Commercial St., Provincetown, August 9 – 22. There will be an opening reception on Friday, August 9 at 7 p.m. For more information call 617.905.7432 or visit fourelevengallery.com.
