Mary V. Marsh at Donna Seager Gallery

Mary V. Marsh

Everyday Readers, Mary V. Marsh at Donna Seager Gallery Everyday Readers
Oakland, California: Quite Contrary Press, 2009. Open Numbered Edition.

3.75 x 5.5 x .5"; 16 pages. Handprinted block prints on library checkout cards, gouache, mulberry paper, brads, type. Bound in found vintage cover. Each book in the edition varies with the discarded library cards used. Slipcased in a manila folder.

Mary Marsh: "Drawings of people reading made during my daily commute are translated into block prints and handprinted onto discarded library cards. The commuters engaged in their own private world intersect with book titles and signatures of past readers. The office materials used to construct each book imply tasks workers are bound for. The nostalgia of the old cards suggests a history of the changing methods of reading."
$186

Mary V. Marsh
CV
Years of working in libraries have influenced Mary V. Marsh's materials and her process. She collects and categorizes images and discarded library materials to look at reading, consuming and propaganda. Images combined with found words on library checkout cards are made into one-of-a-kind and small-edition books. A shared love of hiking and journal keeping and practicing art together, has evolved into collaborative works with husband Tony Bellaver.

Marsh was born in Portland, Oregon and has been living and making art in the Bay Area since 1982. She received an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1992 where she met her husband Tony Bellaver. She has exhibited in many venues in the Bay Area with solo shows at; San Francisco Art Commission at Grove Street, San Jose Museum of Art, Berkeley Art Center, and San Francisco Public Library. Currently a member of Mercury 20 Gallery in Oakland, she makes unique and small edition artist books under Quite Contrary Press.