The Guise of Calm Painting

Born in Portugal, Maria’s family emigrated to New York where she attended school and went on to graduate from Parson’s School of Design (NY) with a BFA in Illustration. Her career has spanned graphic design, print production, web design, computer graphics trainer, and technology research and strategy. Nevertheless, throughout Maria has pursued her primary passion of creating art. After many years of working traditionally in a realistic style using oil on canvas and wood, Maria transitioned to abstract painting. Creating abstract work has allowed her more freedom and opportunity to showcase feelings, intuition, ideas, and individual expression. Transitioning to abstract work has been challenging and exciting and taken a lot of determination and hard work to reach the point of finally being happy with the work being created. 2020 and 2021 were very challenging years for the US and the world. It prompted many people to reassess their role in life and what changes needed to be made, the pandemic changed a lot of our thinking. This current work is what emerged with doing things differently and going for it. ‘I am feeling the joy of expressing what I like and letting the colors and shapes run free’. Maria’s work is mixed media using acrylic, collage, and a variety of mark-making tools. Working on cradled wood panels and gallery-wrapped canvases, the artwork is comprised of multiple layers of paint, marks, collage, drawing, and textures. Color, values, composition, and shapes are used to add interest to the work. Many of the abstract paintings have been composed so they can be displayed in any orientation the viewer prefers.