Today we’d like to introduce you to Mary Ellen Wells.
Hi Mary, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Hmmm… How I started? Like most artists, I’d have to go to my childhood. I’ve always been known as a “busy body.” I was always creating ways to keep myself occupied, whether it was being outside from sun up to sun down with nature, planting beautiful flowers with my grandmother (lovingly called Nanny), sewing pillows or doll clothes, or painting rocks and selling them at the end of my Nanny’s driveway. I would cut out homes, rooms, or gardens from Traditional Home, Southern Living, or any magazine I found that I would discover a view into a world I wanted when I grew up. I was drawn to aesthetic at an early age.
Move forward to 19 years old; I was hired as Christmas help at Riverbend Galleries in Vicksburg, MS., where I lived at the time. This is my hometown, and although it may be a small southern city rich in history and culture,
it is full of artists and art collectors. Riverbend offered high-end museum-quality custom framing, as well as a gift shop with more high-end gifts and collectibles.
I learned everything about custom framing over my 10 years there, and that stoked my desire to create my own art! My heart would feel like it was going to jump out of my chest when a beautiful art piece would grace my counter. I took so much pride in choosing the perfect framing to complement each piece. I was young and couldn’t afford some of the pieces I was framing, so I just learned through lots of trial and error. I’d purchase books and take art classes from local artists. I started in watercolor, then acrylic, oil, mixed media, and in recent years have added encaustic (pigmented beeswax manipulated with a heat gun or blowtorch) and cold wax to my art medium menu.
Word grew of some of my pieces, and I started selling to friends and friends of friends. Design shops represented me and that led to doing commission work for the designers and their clients.
I moved to Frisco, Texas with my 2 children in 2010 and continued working with designers and doing commission work as I was a new single mom and enjoyed the supplemental income. Today, I’m now remarried since 2016 and have been helping raise my blended triplet children full time. We are a very busy family, but I still make time to create in my home studio whenever time allows. Our 3 children are now seniors, and as much as I’m going to miss them when they go off to college, I look forward to having more time to expand my art business.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My biggest challenge is not having the time to paint as much as I’d like to. My 1st priority has always been being a mom and being available to raise my children and now 3 stepchildren. My oldest daughter is 28, my son 23, and we have (3) 17-year-olds while your never finished being a mom, I’m so ready to jumpstart my professional life!
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
I have different goals for different projects. When working on a commission piece whether it be through a designer or directly with the client, my main goal is that it connects to them at a deeper level than maybe a piece purchased at a gallery or design studio. A commission is designed and created specific to their designs colors (down to a paint chart fan!), size, type of image, preferred medium used, but most importantly to THEIR family/ memories/ even down to inscribing important dates, birthdays, life motto, scripture, photos, articles, place of honeymoon, etc., etc. I like to place these chosen special touches in places where you can see them, but they don’t scream at the viewer. You may need to look a little deeper and enjoy the “walk” around the canvas to find them.
When working within my own non-commission style- I work quite the opposite. I work completely intuitively, in a go wherever it feels right attitude. I kind of have a plan for palette and design, but more often than not, I end up doing whatever I feel in the moment. I call this my YOLO art! I often take my paintings to my favorite place on earth, which is underneath the water. I love to scuba dive (can you tell I’m a Cancer? 🦀), and my husband videos all of our dives for me to watch and place into my subconscious. Many times these feelings, shapes, or images of fish, coral, and sea flora come out in my intuitive processes.
What may set me apart from other artists is that I have an extensive background in custom framing and know what looks great complimenting the art yet not competing with the homes design. I like to say art is the exclamation point in a room! I’m happy to meet with a client at a professional framers for a small fee.
I also have a great eye for design; while I do not carry an ASID, I have been hired several times for freelance work when living in MS, TN, and now TX. I also install all my work for my clients, so no need to hire a professional hanger at $75/hr. Exceptions only for very large pieces.
As stated earlier, for the last 28 years, raising my 5 children has been priority, but I do see in my near future moving my art toward branding with home goods and textiles! That would truly be a dream come true for me.
What matters most to you? Why?
It matters a great deal that my work bring a feeling of lightheartedness, joy, a flutter, and a smile on their heart whenever my client passes it. I have pieces I’ve owned for decades, and I still have that feeling when I see them. I still find tiny areas that I didn’t see before or that I’d forgotten were there, waiting to be discovered.
In life, there is and will always be sorrow, pain, challenges, anxieties, and fears, but we HAVE to find those soft places to land, or we will go mad. Art for me is that soft place where for a moment, I can forget all the negatives of the day, rejoice in life’s unexpected gifts, and just simply let go and enjoy how it makes me feel or where it takes my mind.
Pricing:
- My pricing varies from $65-$5000 depending on size or medium. I paint anywhere from 6×6 to 60×72 usually on 2” thick Pro Series canvases that do not need to be framed, (unless client wants it), as I wrap my art around the side.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: Mary Ellen Studios
- Facebook: Mary Ellen Wells or Mary Ellen Studios
Image Credits
Hunter Rutledge photography
