Marissa Nadler (born April 5, 1981) is an American dream-folk and fine artist based in Boston. She grew up in a small town in Massachusetts. She studied painting at Rhode Island School of Design but song-writing became her favored artistic outlet. While exploring old artistic techniques such as illustration, painting, bookbinding, woodcarving and encaustic painting, she also began to hone her songwriting craft. She is a self taught guitarist, who as a teenager learned to play in a style similar to Cotton picking, playing a steady bass pattern with the thumb and filling out syncopated rhythms with the index finger. She is also self-taught as a singer.