Mary-Austin Klein (born 1964 in San Bernardino, California) is an American landscape painter best known for her small-scaled and highly detailed paintings[1] of the southwestern United States.
Klein's work continues the Impressionist tradition of early California fine artists like William Wendt and George Gardner who explored the west at the behest of the Southern Pacific Railroad Company, exchanging paintings for rides. Like these early California artists, KleinâÂÂs oil paintings celebrate the bright, colorful light of the southwest. In his blog, Made in Frogtown, the artist and former newsman William Lagattuta notes her âÂÂability to... reduce enormous, powerful landscapes into small, extraordinarily detailed paintingsâÂÂ.[2] The paintings often include evidence of manâÂÂs impact on these landscapes, documenting the changing environment and the fragility of the ecosystem.
Her work has been exhibited internationally, as part of the traveling show âÂÂCalifornia Dreaming: An International Portrait of Southern Californiaâ and has been shown at the Riverside Art Museum, the Oceanside Museum of Art, the Bakersfield Museum of Art and the Santa Paula Art Museum. Collectors include artists Wayne Thiebaud and Alma Allen, Nicole Panter, Adam Blackman, Dan Greaney, Jenji Kohan and Christopher Noxon.
Los Angeles band I See Hawks In L.A. featured a song named for KleinâÂÂs signature painting style entitled âÂÂMary-Austin Skyâ on their 2012 CD "A New Kind of Lonely".
[1] âÂÂReview of Into the BlueâÂÂ, by Liz Goldner, ArtScene, June 2016
[2] âÂÂI See Mary-Austin Skies in LAâ by William Lagattuta, Made in Frogtown Blog, August 2012