Mariana Murta, Born in 1991 in Antwerp, is currently participating at the STARTPOINT Prize 2017 with Embrace, her last series of paintings, which take up an entire wall of the Academy’s venue at the Art et Amicitiae building in central Amsterdam.
Upon arrival her artwork it’s of a certain impact, as the uniformly large format of the series and it’s vivid color palettes achieve the same effect of stained windows in a church. This association also defines the existential arena in which the paintings are set. From the neutrally optimistic environment of an aircraft interior, the painting takes us directly to the battlefield of life with all its pressures and current social problems.
Mariana is fascinated by the feeling of being obsessed with those objects in our daily life from which we cannot detach ourselves from, even while we remain aware of their artificiality. This process is the main element of her research, the ability and struggle to find what helps us (or not) to create the image that we portray of ourselves to the world.
In Embrace, Mariana combines aggressively reassuring pastel tones with intense colors, and sections defined by rapid bruchstrokes are contrasted with the minute detailed of almost horror movie-like deformed parts of human bodies. This introverted relentlessness strikes a chord in all of us.
View more of Mariana Murta’s work here.
STARTPOINT 2017 – PRIZE FOR EUROPEAN ART GRADUATES
The STARTPOINT Prize 2017 is the largest and most prestigiuos competition for the graduates of European art academies, which was held in Prague at the Fair Trade Palace of The National Gallery, from October 19th to December 10th, 2017.
Part of the graduates are now on show at the Art et Amicitiae building in central Amsterdam.
The curatorial team has selected 25 finalists from 39 schools and 17 countries, all of whom are personally invited for the installation and opening. On the opening day of october 18, the international jury, consisting of curators and directors of major european institutions, will jointly select the holder of the main prize and several honorary mentions that include a residency stay in prague during the following year. In addition, the winner will be provided with funds for the production of his/her own catalogue. All participants are also presented in the project‘s catalog and its website.
