Mary Didoardo builds her oil paintings on panel in accumulated layers, then excavates them. She lays down packaging tape over a chosen layer, draws her line, cuts it out with an X-Acto knife, then paints over it again. When she pulls the tape away, flakes of paint lift with it, exposing hidden colors and the full history of the surface beneath.
In the resulting compositions, fields of bold color vibrate with generous, looping lines of contrasting color that meander on the edge of disorder but resolve into balance. It is both intellectual and visceral: chaos held in balance through the sheer sensuality of material.
She Says” This process integrates and embeds the line and keeps it from being simply a design element. It draws the space. The many stages are visible and are there for the viewer to read. Consistent in most of these paintings is the underlying evidence of previous stages of "failed paintings" rising to the surface through layers built up, scraped down, enriching the final version.”
Mary Didoardo lives and works in Long Island City. She received her BFA in Art Education from Pratt Institute where she studied Sculpture and Painting. Her work has been exhibited extensively in New York including at the Strohl Art Gallery at Chautauqua Institution, White Columns, the C.G Jung Foundation, and the Painting Center. She is a recipient of the Enrico Donati Foundation Grant and has been a resident at the Millay Colony.
Mary Didoardo is represented by Kathryn Markel Fine Arts, with gallery locations in Chelsea, New York City at 529 West 20th Street and at 179 10th Avenue.