Mary Laine

Mary Laine is a full time mixed media artist with over 25 years’ experience making, exhibiting, and teaching.  She has over 50 exhibitions under her belt all over the world, and has lived and worked in Wellington, New Zealand since 2003 when she moved from San Francisco.

Mary’s inspiration draws from our internal stories of the overall human experience and the beauty of human suffering.  She tells these stories through the emotive faces on her dolls and marionettes that invite the viewer to project their own mood and emotional state on to them.  Instantly there is a connection, but unique to each person. 

Mary’s creatures also play with an ambiguity in gender and age, often turning our preconceived ideas of both on its head.  Lines are blurred between humans and animals, the grotesque yet fabulously-dressed, the dark yet whimsical. 

Each of Mary’s pieces is One of a Kind.  She combines technical skill and planning with intuitive creation which results in her pieces encapsulating a lot of herself and her own stories.  Each piece goes out in the world already beloved as it becomes the embodiment of shared human experience inviting the viewer to contribute their own story.