Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Mary Ahern. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Mary, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

I’m a big believer in life-long learning and have been steadily taking classes, and workshops, both in and out of formal pathways for over 40 years. I’ve acquired the skills I needed as my career zig and zagged in a variety of directions over the course of my life. I have formal degrees in fine art and in ornamental horticulture plus a certificate in botanical illustration. Inside the classroom, I also studied computer programming and logic. Over time I continue to take workshops in marketing, and writing as well as workshops in various artistic mediums and genres.

These continuing studies give me a great left-brain/right-brain balance in order to succeed in my chosen fields. I offer a rare diversity of skills for a working artist having both the logical and creative sides of my brain actively engaged.

Mary, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Concurrent with graduating with my BA in Fine Arts where I majored in painting I became a single parent for my two young sons. Not having been raised to work in the conventional workplace, I scrambled to figure out a way to earn a living and painting wasn’t going to pay the bills. So I zigged into studying programming and logic to exercise my left brain. Then I zagged into a career selling computer graphics equipment into the broadcast television and production industries. I had the unique skills necessary to demonstrate and discuss how to use technology tools to create visual art.

After a decade of working for others, I established my own graphic design business utilizing many of the skills I’d accumulated throughout my years in sales and marketing. For my clients, I created their print and online graphics. I designed their brochures, trade show graphics, and also their websites, and online marketing projects.

Throughout my work career, I always maintained my studio art practice since it is the root of all that I do and who I am as a human being. At the present time, I have the good fortune to continue to work independently without needing clients, creating my artwork, showing it extensively in exhibitions and lecturing on art. At the same time, I have offered my time to become extensively involved with the National Association of Women Artists. NAWA was founded in 1889 and is the first professional women’s art organization founded in the US.

As Chair of Public Relations for NAWA, I am able to promote their and my mission of empowering women artists. I use all the skills and experience I’ve accumulated in classrooms, in workshops, online and in sheer life experience to work with other professional women artists to help enhance their careers. Through this work, I am paying it forward as I continue to create and exhibit my own artwork.

Have you ever had to pivot?

My life has been a series of zigs and zags but here is one that stands out for me. As a woman who was not raised to work outside the home, when I became a single parent with two young sons I was terrified. I did not have any marketable skills that I was aware of and knew I needed to accumulate some in order to live the life I had been born into. I found that if you worked for a college you could go to college for free. So I went to the library, this was before Google, & copied down the contact information for all the colleges I wanted to be able to attend. I landed a job at Barnard College, the women’s college of Columbia University. At the Columbia School of Engineering, I attended classes either during lunch break or after work hours to study programming. It was one of the most difficult but most important transitions I ever studied, moving from the right brain of creativity to the left brain of logic.

I found I had a facility for left/right brain thinking but didn’t want to sit behind a computer programming as a career. I used my art training and my computer background to sell computer graphics equipment through direct sales, distribution networks and trade shows. The investment in my own learning has paid off over the years beyond just the financial.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Before there was Photoshop and before there was Apple, I was selling proprietary electronic graphics platforms and paint systems into the television broadcast industry. Since these leading edge products were so difficult for potential customers and decision makers to comprehend I needed to demonstrate how these computers performed In real life situations. Being just about the only woman in the male-dominated field at that time added an additional layer of complexity to my career.

Often, in the sales demonstration sessions, I would sit in front of my computer equipment with monitors projecting my work to the customers. The creative teams that would ultimately be responsible for utilizing my products, would call out from the audience changes they wanted me to perform live on the system so they could see in real time if these modifications were possible. I would hear them demand, can you do this, can you do that, move it here, move it there, delete this, duplicate that, etc. Many of these sessions mimicked the pressure always experienced by people working in the live TV production environment. These demos would continue until everyone was satisfied they understood the complexity of the systems and whether they could get the jobs done in a more efficient manner than they were currently using.

My visual arts background coupled with my experience with computers enabled me to respond quickly and efficiently to the questions posed by both the creative and engineering divisions. These individual unique skills made for an interesting, far-flung and financially rewarding career.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://MaryAhernArtist.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maryahern
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MaryAhernArtist
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maryahern
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/maryahernartist
• Threads: @[email protected]

Image Credits
All photos by Mary Ahern