When Alessandra Maria laid eyes on Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I at New York City’s Neue Galerie in 2008, a world of artistic possibilities opened up before her.
“When I saw Klimt for the first time, something clicked for me,” remembers the artist, then a student at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. “I realized that you were actually allowed to make work like this. I was gobsmacked. I couldn’t believe that 100 years after this man died he was still giving this incredible gift of beauty, inspiration and transcendence. It became a compass point for me.”
Decima, Agrippa, and Lucia, Manifesting Bloom of Morning Glory, paper, charcoal, 23-karat gold leaf, carbon pencil, black paint, sumi ink, pastel, 43 x 39"
The influence of Klimt and “his unabashed use of patterns and gold leaf” is readily apparent in Maria’s work, which she creates out of many layers of charcoal, carbon pencil, ink, paint and pastel before adding her gilt accents and adornments. “I love the effect of it,” she says. “I love the way light will reflect off it and shift its shape.”
The use of gold leaf also points to Maria’s fascination with illuminated manuscripts, sacred texts and ritualistic objects, and deeper into the realms of paganism, myth and magic—and all of the shrouded mystery that swirls around matters of the occult. It is out of that place that Maria rises up with her “alternative depiction of female power for the current millennium.”
Herminia, paper, charcoal, 23-karat gold leaf, carbon pencil, black paint, sumi ink, pastel, 28½"
“I have this concept of creating a secret society of women,” says Maria, who likens her creative process to the elaborate worlds she dreamt up as a child. The women she depicts defy the archetypal constraints of virgin, mother and crone. “These women are attractive but also terrifying. They don’t care what men think of them. It’s a form of sacred femininity that has nothing to do with sex.
“I want the viewer to feel like they’re going on a hike at twilight and it’s starting to get dark, and then you realize you’re lost and running through the forest and you’re starting to panic. Then, out of corner of your eye, through the leaves, you see one of those rituals…these women are clearly not human. They’re beautiful but scary and you feel like you’re seeing something you shouldn’t be seeing. It feels dangerous.”
Ima, paper, charcoal, 23-karat gold leaf, carbon pencil, black paint, sumi ink, pastel, 32½ x 25"
Aptly named Rite, Maria’s upcoming show at Chicago’s Galerie Fledermaus will include works in her signature ornate style such as Decima, Agrippa, and Lucia, Manifesting Bloom of Morning Glory, in which the figures are suggestive of a myriad of human cultures while not being of this world at all. Maria will also show new pieces that have a starker aesthetic. She likes to think of them as “initiation portraits,” as if these fierce women posed for them prior to joining this sisterhood that Maria has conjured up in her imagination.
Hortensia Summoning Moonrise, paper, charcoal, 23-karat gold leaf, carbon pencil, black paint, sumi ink, pastel, 34 x 21½"“I’m really inspired by this idea of making my own set of mythology, of creating a record of it,” she says.
Rite marks a peak experience in the artist’s trajectory.
“With this show, I fully released any expectations and chose to dive in purely from a place of love and make the epitome of what I want to see. What would I make if I were completely alone and no one would ever see it? This work is the answer.” —
Galerie Fledermaus 2753 W. Fullerton Avenue • Chicago, IL 60657 • (312) 617-8711 www.galeriefledermaus.com
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