Timeline

Mary Elizabeth Marvin (nee Peterson) is an American abstract painter known for her colorful, mixed media paintings. Marvin’s paintings examine art's restorative properties through transparency, under layering, allusive figuration, gestural line work and exuberant color. “I start with a tiny detail and just keep riffing on it. It happens in a trance, but the classical techniques are the basis of everything I do,” she has said of her work. “I mutate it, rearrange, paint and re-paint repeatedly. I'm always trying for something entirely new, but it must make sense in the same way as a Renaissance painting. It has to hold up in the same time honored tradition.” Born 1965 in Hartford, CT she studied journalism and art history at UConn, and painting under William Christenberry at the Corcoran School of Art. Her early influences included abstract expressionism and later the works of Ellsworth Kelly. She currently lives and works in New Haven, CT. Marvin’s works are held in private collections and licensed and sold via major US retailers.