Mary’s Voice: Posthumously Speaking 20

Detail from “Autumn Hues”

Autumn Hues

By Mary Alice Condley
(1925-2007)

Editor’s Note: Today we present the first of the two of Mary Alice’s still lifes that were recently brought out of storage by her niece Dawn Stella Burke.
    But first a few words about Mary’s approach to painting, or her technique. My wife remembered Mary’s telling her that she always painted by copying other paintings – or pictures of other paintings, usually in books she owned or borrowed. That is, Mary did not paint from direct observation of the things represented. Mary’s daughter, Karen Abbey, whom I asked about Mary’s barn painting that we presented on January 23, told me:

Farewell to Fond Memories:
A Portrait of Rural America,
by R. Bradford Johnson
(Pine Mountain Press, Inc.,
144 pages, January 1978)

I tried to find the original barn picture in a book I gave Mother in 1979 [see image to right], but it wasn’t in there. The author lived and painted in the part of California where I now live. He did many barn paintings, but maybe not that one. Mother had a painting teacher, an older woman named Geneva Metzler, who would get together once a week with a few other women. I have a treasured painting by Geneva, and Mother painted a copy of it that I think is almost as good.

Might Mary have borrowed books of paintings from her teacher?

     Mary’s son Jeff shared the following:

[Geneva] lived about a mile away, and, because Mom didn’t drive, she rode to the sessions with a friend who lived down the street and also took lessons. It is possible that the teacher started the barn painting for Mom to finish. Mom continued painting long after she had her last lesson.

 Thanks to Karen & Jeff for their memories, and to their brother Tim as well, who was the first to remember that his mother’s teacher’s last name was something like what Karen was able to confirm.

    And finally, here’s “Autumn Hues”:

“Autumn Hues,” 8" x 10"

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