Mary Lovelace O’Neal was born in Jackson, MS. She received a BFA from Howard University in 1964 and a MFA from Columbia University in 1969. Intertwined within her praxis is activism, having Civil Rights Movement roots through the mentorship of Martin Luther King Jr., who was mentored by Coretta Scott King,  Malcolm X and James Baldwin.
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Abstraction is utilized as a visual language; within O'Neal’s artwork, it represents "intangible elements of the human spirit." Confidence and humor are seen within her titles, “My paintings and their titles speak for me. They’re not attitudes of despair; they just simply state a factual existence that continues.”

- National Museum of Women in the Arts

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Selected Links

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“A Painter and Social Activist With an ‘Unruly Nature,” The New York Times, March 11, 2020.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, BOMB, Issue 154, 2021.