Mary Herbert

Often working in soft pastels, Mary Herbert explores themes of unconscious memory, lived sensation and the nonlinear time of dreams. Her intimate drawings are obscured by a luminous haze, with nothing ever quite coming into focus. Spectral figures seemingly disappear and reappear, situated within their uncanny worlds of purple lakes, burning forests and coiling snakes.

Herbert, born 1988, received her BA from Goldsmiths, London, in 2010, and more recently graduated from The Royal Drawing School in 2018. She has exhibited her work internationally, including shows at Moskowitz Bayse, Los Angeles; Eve Leibe, London; Lychee One, London; and Fortnight Institute, New York. Her work is held in the The Royal Collection and the British Museum. She has been selected for numerous prizes such as the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize (2019) and the Sunday Times Watercolour Competition (2019). She lives and works in London.