Born in Luton in 1951, Mary Mabbutt went on to attend the Luton School of Art and Loughborough College of Art & Design. Studying at the Royal Academy Schools between 1975 and 1978 for a post-graduate degree, Mabbutt completed a Junior Fellowship at Cardiff College of Art from 1978 to 1979.
After moving to Cornwall to become a tutor in painting at Falmouth College of Art, Mary has received numerous prizes and awards, most notably the prestigious John Moores Painting Prize in 1995. She has exhibited widely, including at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and her work is held in both public and private collections.
Mary’s paintings emerge from her everyday surroundings, working in both small and large scale. Focusing on relationships between colours in her recent works, Mabbutt’s subjects feature observed objects from the spaces and places in her life.
Mary says about her work: “My paintings are derived from particular moments of recognition and awareness, emerging from events and experiences in my life. These moments of recognition are often revealed by qualities of light and relationships of colour, my attention is initially captured and then slowly released and transformed through the processes and materials of painting.”
