Giant Dipper
15 Oct – 14 Nov, 2010
Gallery 2
Opening Reception
15 Oct, 2010 7-9 pm
Press Release
Pierogi is pleased to present an exhibition of recent work by Ati Maier. Maier combines abstraction with landscape and figuration in highly chromatic compositions. There is always a sense of motion, of movement through space, activated especially through her use of multiple lines.
Maier begins each composition with a number of sketches layered one atop another. She notes “I might begin with an abstract grid, add a galactic structure, then landscapes on top. It is in this time-consuming period that shapes begin to form and subside, subdivide and cut through and across one another. I weave the layers of space together in such a way that foreground, middle ground and background along with past, present and future become one dense coherence.” Because of this intuitive and spontaneous process she doesn’t know when she begins what the final composition will be.
Maier is originally from Germany but became hooked on the vast open spaces of the American west after riding through Wyoming on horseback. She is equally fascinated by the vastness of outer space and immerses herself in satellite imagery (especially from the NASA website), scientific theories, technological and geological models, as well as landscapes, maps, and photos. “I am driven by the desire to visually interpret emerging spatial realms implied by new technologies that access virtual worlds.” For her, the traditional practice of painting is the springboard from which she finds ways of visually traveling through futuristic landscapes.
Recently, Maier has developed her drawings and paintings further into the spatial realm using a 3D animation program. Using this technology she can deconstruct her lines and activate them so it feels as though you are moving through the landscape of one of her paintings. Her second 3D animation involves a kind of implosion and explosion of the line into a visual black hole.
Ati Maier currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Her most recent 3D video animation is currently on view in the Fokus Bienial in Lódz, Poland. Her work is part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (NYC), the Museum der bildenden Kuenste Leipzig (Germany), among others, and has been included in exhibitions at the Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg (Germany) and the Whitney Museum of American Art (NYC).