Mary Beath

Mary Beath

Mary Beath works at the confluence of science, art, and nature. After earning degrees in zoology (Duke) and printmaking (Rhode Island School of Design), she lived for ten years in New York’s East Village before moving to Albuquerque in 1989. She is the proprietor of an award-winning illustration/design/writing studio focused on projects concerning the natural world. She began writing seriously in the early 1990s. Her poetry collection, Refuge of Whirling Light (University of New Mexico Press 2005) won the Wrangler Award and was a finalist for a WILLA Award and a Spur Award. Her book of personal essays, Hiking Alone: Trails Out, Trails Home (UNM Press 2008) won the Chair Award/Zia Award. She has also taught in UNM’s Honors Program. After four years of work, she recently finished a novel set in southwestern Colorado in 2007, at the beginning of a new uranium mining boom. Desert Delight Contributor