Artist Mary Whyte ✿ American Artist

Artist Mary Whyte

Mary Whyte was born in Ohio in 1953. Grew up in the countryside. She graduated in 1976 from the School of the Arts in Philadelphia, with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, receiving a teaching certificate. Since then, Mary Whyte has earned undeniable national recognition as an artist. She is known mainly for her watercolors, although she also paints in oils.

She has lived with her husband since 1991 on John's Island, on the coast of South Carolina. They moved there in search of a new life, a new deeper meaning during Mary Whyte's struggle with cancer. She collects much of her inspiration from the descendants of the Gullah (Carolina's coastal slaves). By chance I met a group of these elderly townspeople who gather weekly in a small village church to make blankets, study the Bible and just socialize. The meeting and further communication with these hardworking people made a great impression on her, and in the next 10 years, she wrote many works dedicated to these people and their lives. In the portraits, the observant and experienced viewer will see a lot, from the features of the clothing to the poses characteristic of various professions.

Mary Whyte's watercolour portraits are not just portraits, they are life stories studied and experienced in detail. Each picture contains emotion and comprehension. Here is the very case when the artist leaves not just fantasy, but personally experienced fragments of human lives. Here is a documentary chronicle of events in a small corner of our big world ...