A journey to abstraction

Martha Walden is a mixed media abstract artist based in Quincy, IL, whose work explores the confluence of disparate materials in contrast with subject matter.

Martha creates abstracts that pull together themes of her world travels, women’s rights and causes, and the overarching issues in our current political mess… and the flowers in her garden.

Her early focus was on drawing, and developing her skills through college extension programs at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Pasadena City College, Pasadena, along with classes at regional art centers.

A lover of vintage artifacts and art, she has collected loads of art supplies from estate sales. This bounty was the impetus to explore other media and the interaction of diverse materials in abstraction. She creates with paints + odd bric-a-brac, loving the surprise outcomes.

Her work has been exhibited at the Kenosha Public Museum, Quincy Art Center, Hannibal Arts Council, and Springfield Art Center, the current group show at The Art Gallery on 6th, and an upcoming show at Angad Arts Hotel, St. Louis. A number of her works are in local and regional personal collections.

In 2025 she became a member of the artist co-op, Alliance Art Gallery, Hannibal, MO. In 2026 she was invited to be a member of the board of directors for Quincy Art Center, Quincy, IL.

Martha’s latest series studies the constraints of “Staying in Line”, which plays on the flowing abstract figurative colored pencil drawings done some ten years ago. She also has a new work in development that brings another dimension to abstraction of life experiences. She is working towards incorporating photos and accounts of her past that develop a narrative of her travels and experiences.