Mary Dignan was born with moderate to severe hearing loss, but her deafness was not diagnosed until she was almost 5 years old.
She earned her undergraduate degree from Santa Clara University in 1976 and embarked upon a career that included newspaper reporting, legislative work for the U.S. House of Representatives and the California State Assembly Committee on Agriculture, public relations, and governmental liaison work with one of California's largest and most complex water agencies, and her own consulting business in the field of water and natural resources management policy.
In 1990, a year after she was certified legally blind, she started law school. In 1994, she earned her Juris doctorate with honors from the University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, was admitted to the California State Bar and began practicing water and natural resources law with the Sacramento firm of Kronick, Moskovitz, Tiedemann & Girard. In 1997, she discovered she had a brain tumor and underwent surgery to remove it. The tumor and the surgery exacerbated and complicated her vision and hearing losses, and she has not practiced law since.
Instead, she practices healing and art and has a lot more fun. After ten years of increasing deafness, she received a cochlear implant in 2008 and is delighted to be back in the hearing world again. In addition to her art, she focuses her energy on writing, public speaking, enjoying her dream kitchen, and community volunteer work. Her community service record includes six years (including terms as chair and vice-chair) on the Disability Advisory Committee to the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors; nine years with Spirit in the Arts, a joint community outreach project of Bread of Life (including two years as a member of the board of directors) and is presently serving on the board of the local Sacramento chapter of Foundation Fighting Blindness.
| Title | Medium | Year | Size | Acquired | Picture |
| Rainbow Ghost |
3D color Mary is a DB artist, so texture is important in her artwork. This is a portrait of a face with one gold heart shape in the left eye and a translucent purple stone in the right eye. |
2009 | 400 x 400 x 24 cm. |
Purchased by Joan Naturale, NTID Librarian |
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