| Mary Snowden | |
| Birth Place: | Johnstown, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Education: | Brown University, University of California, Berkeley |
| Occupation: | Painter, educator |
| Awards: | SECA Art Award (1974) |
Mary Snowden (born 1940) is an American painter and educator. She is known for works that use humor to explore issues of feminist identity and consumerism.[1]
Snowden was born in 1940 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania.[2] [3] She received a BA degree from Brown University, and a MFA degree from the University of California, Berkeley.
Snowden is perhaps best known for her works about the suburbs and motherhood.[4] Starting in the mid-1990s Snowden's paintings utilized 1940s and 1950s advertising imagery, focusing on the products, images, and fashions of the era to humorously critique limitations in cultural ideas about gender and homemaking.[5] [6] Around 2010, she started used stitching to depict rural farm life.[7] [8]
Snowden was the first female artist to win the SECA Art Award from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 1974.[9] Snowden is Professor Emeritus of Painting Drawing at the California College of the Arts.[10]
Snowden's notable past exhibitions have been at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1975), Gallery Henoch (1991), and the Braunstein/Quay Gallery (1997).[11] Her work is in museum collections including the Kemper Art Museum,[12] Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco,[13] di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art,[14] among others.