After studying Fine Art at Mount Allison University, Mary Pratt (1935–2018) settled in Newfoundland with her husband and strove to pursue her passion for painting amidst the demands of raising a family. Over her career, Pratt developed a painting technique that embodied qualities of light, depth of field, and focus evocative of the photographic image, creating a body of work that renders the common everyday items of our lives somehow luminous. Pratt is a Companion of the Order of Canada and was awarded the Molson Prize in 1997.