At 76, painter Mary Sprague seems to be picking up speed, moving from chickens to trees to rhinoceroses like a hopped-up naturalist. . . .
The public concurs. Ms. Sprague’s show several years ago of large-scale, delightful chickens, at Duane Reed Gallery, sold out.
Robert Meyerowitz, At Home St. Louis magazine,
March/April 2011
She is a lively and openhanded mix of infectious friendliness, a woman who lives her life head-on with gusto and good humor, who clearly
takes delight in the raw stuff of living.
James Yood, Mary Sprague: In Appreciation,
Mary Sprague Drawings and Paintings 1960-2000.
Exhibition Catalog, 2002
In five decades of making art, Sprague (’56, MA ’63) has combined the ethereal with the earthy, a saucy abandon with a steely discipline, creating paintings of
seemingly ordinary subjects imbued with mystery and meaning.
Susan Caba, Drawn and Feathered.
STANFORD, March/April 2007
Read more.
. . .it can, at times, take the breath away. . . .The work defies my attempts at written description – it must be looked at to be appreciated. . .
Robert W. Duffy, Art That Leaves You Breathless.
Saint Louis Post-Dispatch, April 26, 1992
Sprague taught her students that the mind makes the drawing, not the hand. Clearly, a highly original mind made the drawings in this book.
Jack Heinz, Mary Sprague Tree Drawings
Exhibition Catalog, 2008
Sprague uses clay with such fluidity that it gives the appearance of paint . . . Sprague allows her clay to function naturally, and doesn’t resist its character:
it slides, collapses and suffers the effects of gravity.
Andrea Powers Schankman, curator, Sum and Substance,
The Gallery at the Regional Arts Commission. 2005
Six drawings of trees, so densely inked the paper seems three-dimensional, are pinned on her display wall. These are small, still pieces.
Motion is confined to shifting light.
Susan Caba, Ruffled Feathers.
American Style, April 2008
These chicken drawings are gorgeous and loose.
. . .Sprague’s technique is both delicate and robust; always the drawings are about contrast and observation.
Margaret Hawkins,
Drawings no small appreciation of chickens.
Chicago Sun-Times, May 5, 2006
Her talent for composition and draftsmanship are astounding.
John Wright, Master Class.
The Riverfront Times, January 22-28, 1997
For people who love and know drawing, this is mark making at it’s most controlled and spontaneous, it’s most rich, lush, and evocative.
Sun Smith-Fôret, Mary Sprague Tree Drawings.
Art Saint Louis / Art Dialogue, September 23, 2008
Sprague could have been a fine realist . . . and this work [
Sink] shows the same appreciation for things as they are in the world that you find in works by
artists as different as Lucian Freud and Antonio Lopez-Garcia.
David Bonetti, The artist who wanted it all.
Saint Louis Post-Dispatch, July 20, 2003
But most important they [chicken drawings] declare the artist’s powers of observation and her ability to make pictures that have a pulse.
Robert W. Duffy, Drawings That Detonate.
Saint Louis Post-Dispatch, January 9, 1997
Mary Sprague’s most recent drawings, . . . are distilled mixtures – blueprints that describe both physical and psychological space.
Alexandra Bellow, Layers of Meaning.
West End Word, February, 1991
Although her belief in the bizarre and the absurd fuels a strong humorous streak, she takes her art very seriously.
Laurily K. Epstein, Words and Pictures.
Voice, February 22, 1989
Thank God for Mary Sprague.
Ivy Cooper, Off the Beaten Path.
The Riverfront Times, April 23-29, 2003
Art Remarks That I Remember
(mostly about the ceramics)
Mary Sprague
Oh, so you are making little clay objects now?
Bob Cassilly, City Museum
I don’t think she can do it.
Arthur Osver, painter. d. 2007
Don’t forget your way to the Grumbacher store.
Bob Duffy, Saint Louis Post-Dispatch
Are you out of your mind?
Jim Burke, Saint Louis Art Museum
I can’t sell that shit.
Elliot Smith, a former dealer
I don’t know what you are, but you’re no minimalist.
Peter Marcus, studio mate
Never mind, she’s senile.
Elisa Forgelman, studio mate
Your horses are better than hers.
Adam Aronson, collector, d. 2007
I’ll take two.
Bonnie Speed, Director of the Emory University Art Museum
Art is a lie that tells the truth.
Pablo Picasso, who took up ceramics in his mid-sixties.
I get by with a little help from my friends.
John Lennon, Paul McCartney
Rhinoceros!
