From Winter into Spring, by a Mohawk Valley Artist

Ezra Pound, who found his calling as a poet at Hamilton College, rejected his native land as unfit for true artists and gloried in a self-imposed exile, writing:

O helpless few in my country,
O remnant enslaved!

Artist broken against her,
A-stray, lost in the villages,
Mistrusted, spoken-against.

Lovers of beauty, starved,
Thwarted with systems,
Helpless against the control

But there have been, and are,  many artists in this region who were not broken nor lost in our villages, lovers of beauty who have been inspired by their native land to create works that may not be known to the wider world, but which are highly valued among us. Such a person was Mary Louise Ryan, whose watercolors and oil paintings of the Mohawk Valley we celebrate in this post.

Mary Louise at work on Crum Creek, 1964

Paintings by Mary Louise recently sold in 2018 on the internet:

The Rollway, c 1960

 Artist's Model c 1960