Regarded as one of Canada's finest still life realist artists, Mary Pratt's luminescent paintings form the visual focus of Goose Lane Edition's Mary Pratt, a career retrospective that examines every aspect of this unique artist's creative journey. Featuring seventy-four full colour reproductions of Pratt's most renowned works and a complete chronology of her career, including an selected list of her solo and group exhibitions, the book is augmented with a series of essays by five acclaimed art critics, curators and essayists.
In "Look, Here", Mireille Eagan deftly dissects Pratt's craft by examining the relationship between location, subject and technique in her work. Sarah Fillmore's "Vanitas" visits the artist at home, giving a firsthand account of how the simple pleasures found in the family kitchen served as the inspiration for some of Pratt's most revered pieces. "A Woman's Life" by Sarah Milroy is a detailed discovery of how the women in Pratt's past defined her presence, and informed her future. Catharine M. Mastin studies the artist as a young woman in "Base, Place, Location and the Early Paintings", which traces the roots of her creative identity from the streets of Fredericton, New Brunswick to the shores of the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland. In "Bedevilling the Real", Ray Cronin argues that Pratt's evocative illusions defy characterization and redefine the relationship between realism and representation.
Mary Pratt is published by Goose Lane Editions in conjunction with an exhibition of her art, organized by The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery, and the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia.
Mireille Eagan is curator of contemporary art at The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery, St. John's. Prior to this, she was curator at the Confederation Centre Art Gallery in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. Eagan has lectured nationally on Canadian art and has published several catalogues and essays on Canadian artists. She has a special interest in promoting the activities of artists based in the Atlantic provinces.
Sarah Milroy is Chief Curator at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection. A highly respected art critic and exhibition curator, she has contributed to more than a dozen books on art, including Mary Pratt, From the Forest to the Sea: Emily Carr in British Columbia, and David Milne: Modern Painting.
