Artist Mary Ramsden’s “Desire Line” Explores the Quiet Magic of Paint

Mary Ramsden’s latest exhibition, “Desire Line,” at Pilar Corrias is a poetic exploration of intuition, materiality, and the quiet magic of paint. Borrowing its title from the naturally carved paths created by instinct and repetition, the show embodies the fluidity and spontaneity of movement, both in the physical world and on the canvas. Ramsden’s paintings transcend strict representation or narrative, conjuring landscapes of the mind and heart where abstraction and figuration entwine, their boundaries dissolving in a poetic, ever-shifting harmony.

Rooted in the luminous textures and earthy tones of her North Yorkshire surroundings, Ramsden’s works transcend the local to explore the universal. In pieces like Dark Oxygen and My Desire is Not a Thinking, her brushwork feels alive—suggesting moonlit fields, the dappled play of light, or the soft haze of dawn. Yet these glimpses are fleeting, intentionally ambiguous, inviting the viewer to fill the spaces with their own perceptions and memories. Ramsden’s mastery lies not in providing answers but in posing questions, as her canvases unfold like fragments of untold stories.

Mary Ramsden’s Sixth Solo Show with Pilar Corrias Unfolds

Drawing inspiration from the subtle palettes of Bonnard and Vuillard, the literary musings of Calvino, and the dramatic shifts of perspective inspired by Brecht, Ramsden’s work resists simplicity. Each stroke of paint carries layers of history and possibility, a kind of visual archaeology that reveals its depths gradually. Her practice, described as “thinking with the hand”, is as much about process as it is about outcome—a tactile meditation on time, space, and the myriad ways paint can capture the ephemeral.

“Desire Line” marks Ramsden’s sixth solo exhibition with Pilar Corrias, reflecting the continued refinement and depth of her artistic vision. Accompanied by an essay from novelist Daisy Hildyard and a poem by Danielle Wilde, the exhibition bridges painting, literature, and thought, creating a multi-layered experience for its audience. As Ramsden reflects on her work in this interview with Whitewall, she offers insight into her inspirations, her practice, and the paths—both literal and metaphorical—that shape her unique vision of contemporary painting.

WHITEWALL: The title “Desire Line” suggests ideas of spontaneity and habitual passage. What inspired you to choose this title, and how does it relate to your approach to painting in this body of work?

MARY RAMSDEN: I like the phrase “habitual passage” and how it speaks to the practice of painting. There is something deeply repetitive yet almost religious about turning up in the studio every day, searching for the most surprising and autonomous route to something indefinable. I wanted this relentless endeavor to feel present in the show.

“There is something deeply repetitive yet almost religious about turning up in the studio every day,”

Mary Ramsden

As with so many of my titles, I want it to offer a few different ideas. The location of my studio in North Yorkshire makes me aware of the different tracks made by humans and livestock that crisscross the fields, etching marks into the landscape. I’m surrounded by lines made and remade by steady, habitual footfall—so maybe there’s a connection to the steady, repetitive practice of painting. These visible connections between things are, to me, like representations of interlacing networks beneath the ground, from tree to tree—and by extension, all the imperceptible mapping of energies between us.

The title is also connected to my interest in embedded or nested stories that you might find within a larger narrative—a capsule interruption in a poem or novel that might reframe the surrounding text. I try to work with this literary device in the studio, but as paintings within paintings. This manifests as sort of janky zones in an image that are handled differently from the rest of the painting. There might be a gruffer sort of paint application or a slower delivery of the mark. The contrast between the different zones aims to bring the focus back to the action of painting, maintaining an active and restless surface. Besides, I like the sound of the two words and how they play off each other. They somehow feel like a drawing.

Exploring the Tension Between Abstraction and Figuration

WW: Your works often explore the tension between abstraction and figuration, allowing for multiple interpretations. How do you navigate this balance, and how does it manifest in Desire Line?

MR: I used to feel preoccupied with this distinction and sometimes a bit paralyzed by the coming and going of recognizable forms in the work. Now I’m learning to accept that it’s really about searching for the most efficient way to unearth the idea in my mind. I understand that moving between abstraction and figuration raises very different philosophical propositions, but the freedom of this ‘promiscuous abstraction’ allows for things to continually jolt me into a new way of responding to a problem. Ultimately, I just try to work with whatever feels necessary to get to where I want to go.

The paintings in “Desire Line” feel closer to abstraction because, in this body of work, I focused on the process—how the marks went down. My preoccupation with the land around me was primarily about drilling down into an attitude or energy. What emerged were the gorges, the hill-like forms, and the wispiness.

Mary Ramsden’s Influences and Creative Process

WW: You’ve mentioned influences ranging from the landscapes of North Yorkshire to the chromatic intelligence of Bonnard and Vuillard. How do these diverse references converge in your new paintings?

MR: Both the painters I’ve been looking at and the landscape here in Yorkshire are about different ways of apprehending light—light as it moves around a room, a tree, or across a moor. In Vuillard’s work, there is a palpable fragmentation of surface that speaks directly to the light of a place, the sensibility created by that light, and how it can be held in a painting. The painting then inhabits a porous threshold between observation and creation, between the world I see and the world I create on the canvas. For example, I try to depict or investigate a particular kind of light while also finding a way to control how the light interacts with the paint. Pushing ‘coloured mud’ around a canvas to talk about light sounds paradoxical, but that’s the negotiation you take on as a painter.

WW: Your paintings have been described as “thinking with the hand.” Could you elaborate on how this idea shapes your creative process, particularly with the layering and excavation seen in Desire Line?

MR: Paintings often already have an essential self, and the process for me is about trying to find it—digging through mud, like an archaeologist. The painting is much more likely to assert itself when the making allows for enough human error that the searching becomes visible to the viewer. This comfort with vulnerability reveals what it means to be a human making marks—and that’s what the thinking hand is digging away at or trying to communicate.

WW: Many of your paintings in this show evoke a sense of light and atmosphere that feels simultaneously specific and otherworldly. What role does light play in your work, and how does it connect to the emotional or sensory experience you aim to create?

MR: I think light can be a divine proxy for different types of energy. We see this time and time again in Renaissance and Baroque art, but also in Magritte or Hilma af Klint, not to mention Robert Ryman or Agnes Martin. I want to store a particular light in a painting, kind of trap it in the fibers of the canvas. In this show, I was keen for each work to have its own distinct character, underpinned by a glow or vibe I was trying to push into the canvas.

“I was keen for each work to have its own distinct character, underpinned by a glow or vibe I was trying to push into the canvas,”

Mary Ramsden

Artistic Collaborations and Future Work

WW: Your exhibition is accompanied by contributions from a novelist and a poet. How do you see their perspectives complementing your work, and how does literature or language influence your artistic practice?

MR: I wanted to work with Northern writers for this show. I’ve worked with Daisy Hildyard a few times now, and we are often coincidentally thinking around similar concerns. It’s useful for me to see how words are being handled to make sense of ideas related to the ones I’m trying to explore with paint.

“It’s useful for me to see how words are being handled to make sense of ideas related to the ones I’m trying to explore with paint,”

Mary Ramsden

Danielle Wilde’s poetry smashes unconnected worlds together to make something wholly contemporary and alive. The language she attaches to color, such as “bald violet dawn” or “the color of a mending bruise,” made so much sense to me in connection with these paintings. I am often thinking of sensations when mixing color, and these felt close to some of the phrases that go round and round in my head until I land on the right tone that does the thing that’s needed.

I find writers have a way of reducing things down to what is essential, harnessing the fibrous stuff at the margins of experience. This is something I am always trying to get at, and so watching this unfold through language helps to nudge me a bit closer—sometimes more than looking at other works of art. That distance between mediums is useful. I also like the way writers can alter the whole tone of a text with just one word because of the history and social context it brings with it. I try to grapple with the weight of that concision when referring to historical methods of painting. By borrowing a mark from the Nabis group and fixing it adjacent to, say, a fleshy part of the painting that refers to Guston, I’m attempting to squash the timelines and play about by recontextualising both attitudes.

WW: Your career includes exhibitions in major institutions and galleries. How does “Desire Line” reflect your artistic journey so far, and what direction do you envision for your work in the future?

MR: I feel like this show is in dialogue with many of the ways I’ve made paintings over the past decade. There is something about my approach to working that means things shift quite frequently. It sometimes feels urgent and essential to chase something I haven’t seen before, to avoid paralysis. I’ve always needed new problems to solve. But there’s an attitude that remains constant.

I’m starting to work towards a show with Wentrup in Berlin this year and am currently looking at Symbolist painters and writers, where the rhythm of words serves to express forms of transcendence. It’s daunting territory, but let’s see what turns up.

Exhibition page.