Mary Ellen's English art training helps her to sensitively express the ever-changing colors and moods of the Maine coast in her realistic oil seascapes.  She grew up summers right here on Paradise Point, East Boothbay.  After college, she spent three years in England where she studied oil painting with Mr. E.J. Wiley, a landscape artist.  For the next thirty years she resided in Colorado where she painted mountains and especially trees.  It was her life-long dream to come back to Paradise Point to live.  Now she is fulfilling that dream and also painting landscapes.

Her teacher's strength was in his depiction of skies, and his crimson underpaintings created a glow throughout the scene.  Mary Ellen has expanded on underpainting to cast a mood within each piece dependent on the color that shines through.  She finds skies eternally worthy of exploration with color and shade.  Her quest for literalness extends sometimes to more than what is seen, and occasionally leaves out the obvious.  Recent visitors to Paradise Studio in East Boothbay have commented on the clarity and verity of Mary Ellen's colors, and that her work is 'peaceful.'She hopes you delight in her interpretations of the Maine coast.