Artist Biography
Born in Lubbock, Texas, raised in San Antonio, Mary Baxter has felt connected to the Chihuahuan Desert and the Trans-Pecos landscape, ever since family camping trips there as a little girl.
Pursuing a lifelong passion for art, Baxter attended the University of Texas at San Antonio, where she studied painting and advanced printmaking. Her degree was self-financed by working between semesters across the country on the high-goal polo circuit.
In 1995 she moved to a ranch southwest of Marfa to help raise stocker yearlings and train horses. There she reconnected with the West Texas landscape and began to interpret the rugged beauty of the desert in her paintings. Her work began to sell and she eventually freed herself from the ranch work and the training and trading of horses to paint full-time.
While her main studio and gallery is located in Marfa, Baxter uses a vintage Silver Streak trailer to work in more isolated locations, where her smaller paintings are done ‘en plein air’ and the ideas and sketches are gathered for large paintings that will be finished in the studio. This approach allows Baxter to uniquely capture the vast splendor of this remote region of Texas.
Selected Biographical and Career Highlights
Selected Exhibitions
Selected Public Collections
Born in Lubbock, Texas, raised in San Antonio, Mary Baxter has felt connected to the Chihuahuan Desert and the Trans-Pecos landscape, ever since family camping trips there as a little girl.
Pursuing a lifelong passion for art, Baxter attended the University of Texas at San Antonio, where she studied painting and advanced printmaking. Her degree was self-financed by working between semesters across the country on the high-goal polo circuit.
In 1995 she moved to a ranch southwest of Marfa to help raise stocker yearlings and train horses. There she reconnected with the West Texas landscape and began to interpret the rugged beauty of the desert in her paintings. Her work began to sell and she eventually freed herself from the ranch work and the training and trading of horses to paint full-time.
While her main studio and gallery is located in Marfa, Baxter uses a vintage Silver Streak trailer to work in more isolated locations, where her smaller paintings are done ‘en plein air’ and the ideas and sketches are gathered for large paintings that will be finished in the studio. This approach allows Baxter to uniquely capture the vast splendor of this remote region of Texas.
Selected Biographical and Career Highlights
- 1963 Born in Lubbock, Texas
- 1988 BS, Painting and Advanced Printmaking, University of Texas at San Antonio
- 2002–12 Baxter Studio and Gallery, Marathon
- 2005 Best in Show, Trappings of Texas, Museum of the Big Bend, Alpine
- 2006–07 Residency, McDonald Observatory, Fort Davis
- 2011 Residency, Madroño Ranch, Medina
- 2012 – Present, Baxter Studio and Gallery, Marfa
Selected Exhibitions
- 2015 Painting in the Texas Tradition: Contemporary Texas Regionalism, Pearl Fincher Museum of Fine Arts, Spring
- 2015 Ties that Bind: Contemporary Texas Regionalism, Turner House, Dallas
- 2005–09 Annual Animal Art Show, Invitational, Big Bend Venue
- 2014 National Ranching Heritage Museum, Lubbock
- 2014 Painting in the Texas Tradition: Contemporary Texas Regionalism, Turner House, Dallas
- 2005–08 Trappings of Texas, Museum of the Big Bend, Alpine
- 2013 Holidays at the Haley, Haley Memorial Library, Midland
- 2011 Group of four, San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts, San Angelo
- 2010 Solo, Museum of the Southwest, Midland
- 2010 Solo, Hunt Gallery, San Antonio
- 2009 Solo, Eugene Binder Exhibition Space, Marfa
- 2008 Hunting Art Prize Exhibition, Houston
- 2008 Invitational, Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center, Austin
- 2005 Two-person show, Highland Gallery, Marfa
- 2004 Group of five, Baxter Gallery, Marathon
- 2003 Solo, Ballroom Marfa
Selected Public Collections
- Blue Bonnet Electric Cooperative, Bastrop
- Data Foundry, Austin
- McDonald Observatory, Fort Davis and Austin
- Marfa National Bank, Marfa
- Riata Energy, Dallas