Mary Grandpré

Mary Grandpré spent three decades building a wildly successful illustration career before making a bold shift to abstract painting—a move that has captured the attention of the contemporary art world. Born in Aberdeen, South Dakota, and raised in Bloomington, Minnesota, Grandpré discovered art as a young introvert seeking self-expression. Daily mass at Catholic school became her oasis, where towering stained glass windows, rich colors, and radiant saints sparked a lifelong fascination with glowing shapes and visual storytelling that would later define her work.
After studying illustration and painting at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Grandpré developed a distinctive style she called “soft geometry” while working on editorial, magazine, and advertising campaigns. She went on to illustrate over twenty picture books and became world-renowned for her work on the Harry Potter series, in addition to contributing conceptual work for the animated films Antz and Ice Age.
Today, Grandpré’s abstract paintings emerge through an intuitive process—no sketches, no art directors, just loose layers of paint building into shapes and colors that create dreamlike spaces viewers can step into. Drawing inspiration from Salvador Dalí’s dreamscapes, Edward Hopper’s light, and Richard Diebenkorn’s interpretations, she continues to balance space and atmosphere in fresh, fascinating ways. Mary Grandpré is represented by Park West Gallery.