top of page
Search

Artist Mallie Loring Pratt




Mallie Loring Pratt is a painter based in Essex, Massachusetts. Working from both observation and memory, her work explores the sensory and emotional experiences of place. Her paintings often serve as records of change: in landscape, in perception, in ourselves.


Mallie holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design (2009) and an MAT in Art Education from Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (2015). Mallie’s background also includes studies in landscape architecture, and her practice often draws on that sensitivity to space and ecology.


Her work is in private and corporate collections throughout the country. She has shown at Montserrat College of Art, the RISD Museum, The Center For Maine Contemporary Art, Gallery NAGA, Artemis Gallery, and numerous other galleries throughout New England. Mallie taught studio art in independent schools and museum settings for ten years and also ran the Bertolon Gallery at Pingree School. She now co-runs a studio collective in Ipswich, MA where she paints, works on curatorial projects and occasionally teaches workshops.


Mallie is represented by Artemis Gallery in Northeast Harbor, Maine.





"My paintings explore the simultaneously personal and universal experience of immersion within a landscape; where presence, imagination, and memory meet. My work is most often generated from walks, runs, or drives. Through movement, I understand place. I discover objects, plants, and sensations. I am interested in the shift between close-up and distant moments, reflecting the tension between observing a place and being immersed within it. Most recently, I am working directly from the landscape: drawing as I walk. I translate these drawings into mixed media works or paintings in my studio, transferring the energy and literal motion that I experience when “in the field” directly into my work."





Tell us a little about yourself (where you are from) and your background in the arts.

I grew up in Massachusetts, spending a lot of time on an island in Maine as well. I was lucky to go to a small cozy elementary school that emphasized working with your hands. We took required sewing and shop classes on top of art electives. As a youngest child with siblings away at school, I always found projects, whether it was painting my dad’s lobster buoys, helping to build a garden fence, or just sitting around drawing.


Later, in high school, I had summer jobs working for sculptors and designers, taking any opportunity I could to explore what a life in the arts looked like. I had some great role models who made a living making things, and I always knew that’s what I wanted to do.


I went on to study glass at RISD, work for a landscape architecture firm, and eventually devote a decade to art education, getting my masters from Tufts/SMFA. I have now been painting full time for six years. I think that artists have a special kind of license to dabble in all fields. For me, this is why being an artist stuck. One day, you’re doing research on plants or human physiology, the next you’re writing poetry and spending the day reading Joan Didion. The encouragement to have a curious spirit (and to be serious about it!) was always crucial in my education. This gave me the confidence that I could create in any direction, in any medium, without fear. A big idea, a willingness to ask questions, and sometimes just channeling restless energy have gone a long way in my creative practice.


What kind of work are you currently making?

This spring, while traveling for a residency, I started working on large rolls of paper with oil sticks, oils, and collaged paper; things from the studio floor or color tests that were repurposed. Working on paper was originally a logistical choice, but I found that the slick white surface and low stakes quality of paper opened up my mark making and risk-taking. What ensued was an exploration of the language of drawing as used in painting. I worked from sketches I made while walking and hiking, which added an immediacy to the.


In my studio now, I am trying to figure out how some of these new shapes and openness can translate into works on canvas. I am painting the woods and fields around my house, as I often do, but now with a renewed energy and sense of movement. It’s spring in New England, so the long awaited energy is swirling from my veins onto the canvas. I’m working towards a group show in July and a two-person show in December.


What is a day like in the studio for you?

My studio day usually starts with a walk or a run. I have two dogs and this is an essential part of our routine that I have started to think of as an extension of the studio.


Once I arrive at the actual studio, usually late morning, I pace around getting my space cleaned up and organized to work, usually with the company of a podcast. I pull out sketchbooks or sometimes work on a mindless collage to get my hands moving. I have come to realize that the painting part is actually the fastest part of my process. It might take me multiple hours to work up to actually painting. There are, of course, rare days that I can walk through the door and put paint to surface in minutes.


If I'm lucky, I paint until my favorite lunch place is almost closed or out of sandwiches. If I'm even luckier, one of my studio neighbors has reminded me to eat lunch or even picked it up for us and forced me to take a break. I would be lying if I didn't mention the portion of my day that is spent simply talking with the other artists and designers in my space. It's the biggest gift of a shared space.


I paint until I run out of time and I have to pick up my kids!


Three days a week at the start of the day I deal with my inbox and what I generally refer to as my "computer tasks". I wish it was a strict schedule- it's getting close! I am trying to get creative about the administrative parts of a practice: emails, proposals, applications, ecommerce, marketing, inquiries, price lists, show statements.


What are you looking at right now and/or reading?

Right now I am reading Visual Intelligence by Amy Herman. Probably from my teaching days, I continue to be fascinated by visual literacy and visual culture. The images that surround us shape us, and most people don’t spend their days honing a critical eye. Particularly as change around us is so rapid, I think diving into visual literacy is both fascinating and crucial.


I also love reading books about the history of New England forests. Reading The Forested Landscape is on my bedside table. I live in a patch of woods that used to be farmland delineated by old stone walls. As I fall asleep at night I like to read about these forests to better understand my surroundings. I am by no means even a hobby naturalist, but I do find fascination in understanding where exactly I am and how certain plant species arrived here. Perhaps there’s some childlike hope of uncovering treasure in the landscape.


I'm looking at Milton Avery's landscapes right now. He is part of a show at our regional museum which has re-invigorated my love for his distilled and stylized paintings. I am always looking at the decisive and bold marks of my eight and five year old daughters' work. They cut and collage cardboard to create universes I wish I had thought up. I refer often to Lois Dodd, Keiran Brennan Hinton, Lisa Sanditz, and so many more.


Where can we find more of your work? (ex. website/insta/gallery/upcoming shows)













Comments

bottom of page