Foraging Light

When we think about how artists capture plants in their work, we usually imagine botanical representations that put the spotlight on the colors of the flowers and greenery. 

Mary Royall turns that expectation around. She’s a light painter, and her work depicts the silhouettes of plants as light causes them to cast shadows on surfaces. 

“I feel like I am almost an archivist more than a painter because I title my pieces with the location and the date where I forage the light.”

Her grandmother used to say the phrase, “Consider the lilies,” which taught Mary that flowers didn’t need to prove anything to be beautiful and valuable. This philosophy can reflect in our own lives as well. 

“I feel like humans are like plants in that way, and that we feel this crazy pressure to do and be and achieve. But we do not require any of that to just exist and be beautiful.”

With Mary’s paintings, her goal is to encourage more people to stop and notice the world around them. Her process in “foraging light” involves walking around parks and finding a perfect imprint of light to paint, so it allows her to slow down and appreciate the beauty of nature. 

“Once I finished painting that piece, I let it dry. And usually that's a really beautiful moment. I just sit and watch the light move and sit in the grass and the trees.”

A film by Ben Rountree.

Mary’s Instagram.