About Mary Gwyn’s Art

As an artist and art educator based in Tennessee, birds and flowers as inspiration take me back to that magical part of childhood when chickadees chatter and pansies look like kittens. It’s only natural that they would be the focus of my art. A beautiful sunflower is not just a flower, but a dancer following the light of the sun with bends and twirls. As a child of 6, while in isolation in the hospital with measles, my uncle sent in vases of pansies from his garden to keep me company, telling me they were little kitten faces. To this day, I can’t look at a pansy and not see a kitten’s face peering back. My grandmother and great aunt told me stories of the birds as we watched them gobble up the crumbs we threw out into the garden for them. They taught me about their different personalities as we made up names for them like Charley Chickadee and Freddie Finch It is my hope that each pillow, bag, or other item with a painting of a bird or flower, will become a source of joy for the person who buys it. Maybe they too will see the face of a kitten or hear the chatter of a chickadee. Maybe they will give their sunflower bag a name and make up a story about it. Perhaps a bright hummingbird pillow will inspire someone to hum a happy tune. Read their story