The scent of Mary Mulholland’s peony roses seems to permeate the air. Mulholland’s large-scale oil paintings are a celebration of perfection, purity and vitality, as she constructs a language between still life and spirituality.

Mulholland’s paintings transport the viewer into a macroscopic world, her roses float in high contrast against a black background, petals becoming abstracted to emphasise colour, texture and form. She moves away from the botanical and watercolour studies commonly associated with floral art, employing vibrant colour, a balanced composition, and clear light reminiscent of the seventeenth century Dutch still lifes.

Mulholland’s apparent realism is deceptive. Her roses are perfect and unattainable – they lack the insects, disease and weather damage which occur in reality. In Dutch art these illusions of space, solidity, texture and light often assume the role of memento mori ("a memento of mortality") - a reminder that life is fleeting and that God is good, but his judgment is stern. Mulholland’s paintings remind the viewer that religion and mortality assume important functions within life and art.

It is the perfection of Mulholland’s peony roses that give her works a profound sense of the spiritual. In her paintings Mulholland wishes to demonstrate that all art leads to God. (1) Through her still-life compositions she attempts to capture the essence of spirituality. “I'm trying to express something that's very difficult to express because you can't see it.” (2)

1. Interview with Marjorie Cook, The Oamaru Mail, 1999.
2. Mary Mulholland, The Oamaru Mail, 1999.