Being part of a large family can be chaotic and loud. There’s no such thing as privacy. But having an army of siblings can also provide built-in friendships and a lifetime of support. As one of 10 kids, Island artist M-C Lamarre knows this well. She beams when she talks about her family. Along with Island-related images, she even incorporates family members into her artwork.
“I give a little nod to my family by including their interests and hobbies into my prints — my dad’s love of baseball, my brother’s love of music, a swan to symbolize when my parents got married,” she says.
Lamarre attended Providence College, where she majored in fine arts, with a concentration in ceramics. “I did my junior year in Italy, which really shaped a lot of my choices,” she says. “Art is influenced by its location, the time it was made, and the resources that are available.”
Like many artists, Lamarre has reinvented herself several times — sometimes out of necessity, and sometimes to avoid creative stagnation. She landed a groovy position as the tour manager for Artrain USA, the nation’s only art museum on a train. “As tour manager, I was responsible for onboard operations from the time the train left Ann Arbor in January until it returned in November. We brought art to communities that might not otherwise have access to it,” she explains.
Once that tour ended, Lamarre needed something new, and wound up painting murals. “I didn’t know how to paint, but I taught myself,” she says.
Since Lamarre is a baseball fan, it’s fitting that her most noted mural work is painting the likeness of Fenway Park’s iconic Green Monster. She has traveled to 23 states and Canada, painting the Green Monster. “I have painted more than 190 Green Monster murals, and they are located in both commercial and residential settings, on both interior and exterior surfaces, in bars, bedrooms, basements, bonus rooms, and more.”
Then COVID hit. “I couldn’t be inside anyplace,” she says. So she reinvented herself again by creating rope baskets. “I didn’t know how to sew, but I bought a sewing machine, spools of rope, and taught myself. Everyone was really responding well to the baskets, but with everything that was happening with my dad, who had Alzheimer’s and dementia at the time, I kept having to go off-Island and help my mom care for him, and then come back and work on the baskets. It was a lot.”
Sadly, two years ago, Lamarre’s father passed away, and two months later, her brother also passed: “When my dad and my brother died, I just sort of lost the wind in my sails. I just couldn’t do art. I have always functioned creatively, so it was upsetting. I tried everything. I went to Maine and found a rubber-stamp-carving class, and it helped me focus. I wanted to learn something new that required 100 percent of my attention.”
On-Island, with the help of Althea Freeman-Miller, artist and owner of Althea Designs, Lamarre began learning the process of carving and printmaking: “I would carve in class and outside of it, and learn more about the process, with Althea’s help. She shared her materials and tools and was very forthcoming, which I appreciated. Printmaking was freeing. It’s not forgiving, so you have to learn to live with errors — unlike with painting.”
Lamarre’s printmaking journey sparked her popular Potluck Prints venture, also lovingly referred to as “vending machine art.” “The original idea for vending-machine art came from a woman in Maine who started it as a way to get her prints out and get quarters to do laundry. These machines were in grocery stores, and filled with stickers and temporary tattoos, when I discovered them.”
Lamarre has four mini-art vending machines that she places around the Island. On her website, she describes what’s inside them: “Each red little box hosts a different collection of hand-carved, hand-colored, and hand-stamped prints by me. Four quarters will bring you a little burst of love in the form of a mini art print. Every single design has been inspired by those I love, those I lost, and experiences that have shaped me, and the little Island of Martha’s Vineyard, on which I live.”
Freeman-Miller says she remembers M-C wanting to create art that felt simple, true, and fun: “She was seeking community. She was feeling the pain of loss. Printmaking served as healing handwork and connection. The vending machines created community. Accessible art. Collection connection. I share a similar story, so I knew the feeling. I love seeing her success, and I proudly hosted a machine at my studio in August. It helped me connect to a new wave of art collectors. So magical!”
The Potluck Prints have been a big success, says Lamarre: “It’s been a whirlwind. People from all over are collecting my cards, and other artists’ cards, online. Since some people aren’t here, I’ve created packs of cards I call ‘mini mailers,’ that I send out. I also try to place the vending machines in different towns at the same time, and in new businesses to help promote them.”
At one point, other community members were invited to create their own Potluck Prints: “I spent the month of January focused on some mural projects and planning the 2026 MV Potluck Prints season. While I was busy at my work, I invited the Island community to pick up blank cards and create prints, cards, or inspirational words that would be put into the mini-art vending machines. The community responded, and I received more than 400 prints. The machines were loaded with all the prints, with the intention that 100 percent of the proceeds were going to M.V. Hospice and Palliative Care, as I utilized their services for 13 months of grief counseling.” Not all of the cards have cycled through the machines yet, so Lamarre is working on a couple of ideas about how to dispense them in order to create a larger contribution to M.V. Hospice.
Lamarre will be releasing new vending machines the first Saturday in May. “They will be at Reliable — Bob will be in the machine again [a print of Bob Pacheco, the owner] — Edgartown Hardware, the Maker, and I’m waiting to hear back from Black Sheep. It’s not a monetary thing,” she continues. “It’s more regaining my sense of self, having lost what was so much a part of myself when my father and brother died — they were two of my biggest cheerleaders.”
Visit M-C’s website, mclamarre.com. You can also find her on social media at instagram.com/mclamarre and facebook.com/basketcasemv#.