Marie Yoho Dorsey investigates origin, inheritance, and the mutable nature of identity through visual systems that intertwine ritual, chance, and material process. Central to her practice is the philosophy of Ikebana, which she studied at Tokyo’s Sogetsu School under Hiroshi Teshigahara. This training informs both her formal and conceptual approach—treating space as active, asymmetry as harmony, and impermanence as a generative force. Negative space becomes a vital presence, and compositions unfold as dynamic relationships between elements, echoing Ikebana’s meditative dialogue with nature while translating its principles into contemporary visual language.

Projects such as Water Stories—created during Art in the Open along the Schuylkill River—extend her inquiry into language and impermanence. Through participatory acts like perforating paper with incense, Dorsey explores how ephemeral gestures can become systems of meaning. In Water Stories (2015–2018), developed during the Art in the Open residency with CFEVA and the Fairmount Water Works, she inhabited a 10’ x 10’ tent along the river with her then eight-year-old daughter, transforming the space into a site for contemplation and participation. Using lit incense sticks to perforate paper, she created patterns that functioned as a visual language—marks that echo the rhythm of storytelling and the passage of time. This work reflects her ongoing interest in systems of meaning and the interplay between material process and ephemeral experience.

Her recent series, Recitations—multimodal copperplate etchings produced between St. Petersburg, FL, and Buffalo, NY in 2022–2023—extends this inquiry by integrating symbolic logics from cartomancy and astrology with experimental printmaking processes. By synthesizing the traditional craft of Sashiko embroidery with contemporary design, Dorsey engages discourses on ritual, semiotics, and the phenomenology of perception. Ultimately, these pieces function as visual epistemologies—systems that resist closure and invite interpretive agency, offering viewers a space to contemplate uncertainty, memory, and the unseen.

During two residencies at MacDowell, this exploration of memory and materiality deepened through works that examine the aura surrounding personal objects and images—the unforeseen influence they exert on us. Using digital images, photocopies, vintage fabric, and silk thread, Dorsey investigated the remnants of her mother’s life after emigrating thousands of miles from her homeland. Black-and-white photographs and fragments of clothing became points of departure for unraveling her story—thread by thread. Loss of country, family, and language left her with only enough “thread” to reconstruct a life elsewhere. In dismantling and reassembling these materials, Dorsey sought to understand and narrate her experience, creating a visual tapestry that reflects both rupture and resilience.

Language in a Room, created during residencies at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, explores the relationship between space, language, and perception. Dorsey produced photograms using partially exposed and expired photographic paper, incorporating Braille as both material and mark-making. Braille became a way to draw and reinterpret the studio space she inhabited—transforming tactile language into a visual system. These works investigate how gesture and code can map presence, translating the unseen into a layered dialogue between touch, light, and memory.

Her work has been exhibited in solo and group shows across the United States, Germany, and Japan, and is held in public collections including the Rockwell Museum (NY), the Museum of Fine Arts (St. Petersburg, FL), the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art at the University of Notre Dame, and the Art Museum at West Virginia University. She has received fellowships and residencies from MacDowell, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and the Artist Relief Fund, NY. Reviews of her work have appeared in ART PAPERS, Art in Print, and dART International Magazine.