Ati Maier The World
Is My Oyster
March 3 - April 3, 2023
"I start with 3-15 overlapping sketches with which I create multiple layers suggesting the possibility of a novel compositional architecture. For example, 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. Through my process the painting is like an organically growing puzzle coming together. The final image can never be predicted, as it is a direct result of the physical and the mental space I am in when I make the work.
I act as a sampler (as in music) of the abundant information available. Scientific theories, technological and geological models, maps, digital and satellite views, as well as NASA websites, books and magazines form the catalyst and interior armature for all of my work.
The vast open landscape and the big sky of the American West became an obsession as I was riding through it on horseback. I am an explorer, using geographical structures, rock formations, unique earth faults, weather phenomena etc. as visual and conceptual sources. Although my work is largely abstract, it is very much about making invisible energies and wavelengths visible.
Recently, I also began working with 3-D animated videos derived from my drawings. I basically rebuild the drawings into a 3D model, making them move through time as well as space. In the animations, as well as my 2-D works, I aim to suggest new visual metaphors for our experience in non-linear, virtual spatial systems."
Ati Maier working on a print at LANDFALL press, Santa Fe, 2017Indicative of the playful nature of Maier’s work in general, the axiomatic phrase “The world is my oyster” invites the viewer to experience a universe spawned of ink, wood stain and pigments, but which also looks entirely convincing as a snapshot of deep space.
This aesthetic world made of lines, shapes, and fields of color became Maier’s oyster over the course of the last three decades.
All the works between 2019 and 2022 were created at the Apache Creek Ranch next to the Santa Fe State Park, where Maier lived and worked in a retreat-like environment, developing a strong spiritual connection to the mountains and pristine lands surrounding her.
Originally born in Munich (Germany), the artist visited the American West for the first time in her twenties, quickly integrating its rugged topography and otherworldly atmosphere into her visual ecosystem. She eventually moved to New York City and continued to make frequent visits to the West where over time her work moved beyond expressionistic landscapes and into fractured geographies generated through a mix of observation, automatism, and action painting technique.
Ati Maier is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice includes drawing, painting, photography, 3-D video animation, installation, performance, and live action video. She was born in Munich, Germany in 1962 and has studied, lived and worked in Vienna, Berlin and New York City.
Maier’s 3D video animation was included in the Fokus Bienial in Lódz, Poland and her paintings are part of the permanent collections at the Museum of Modern Art (NYC) and the Museum der bildenden Kuenste Leipzig (Germany), amongst others. She is a recipient of the Pollack-Krasner Foundation grant and a Joan Mitchell Foundation grant.
Maier's work has been featured in exhibitions at the Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg (Germany) and “Remote Viewing” at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Her work is included in numerous public collections, including the New Mexico Museum of Art; the Museum of Modern Art, the Judith Rothschild Foundation Contemporary Drawings Collection, New York; Parrish Art Museum, Montauk, NY; Aspen Art Collection; MART, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Rovereto and Trentino, Italy; Staedtische Galerie Wolfsburg, Wolfsburg, Germany; Museum der bildenden Kuenste Leipzig, Bergmeier Collection, Germany; BAM Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, CA; Guilin Art Museum, Guilin, Guangxi, P.R. China.
She currently lives in Brooklyn and New Mexico.
Oyster World 2020
Ink, pigment and wood stain on paper
55 x 55 inches
Daybreak Star 2020
Ink, wood stain and pigment on paper
23 x 33.5 inches
27.25 x 37.25 inches framed
Inner Planets
2016
Ink and wood stain on paper
24 x 24.5 inches
27.625 x 27.625 inches framed
Cosmic Device
2018
Ink and wood stain on paper
24 x 24.5 inches
27.625 x 27 .625 inches framed
Black Moon 2016
Ink and wood stain on paper
24.25 x 24.25 inches
27.625 x 27.625 inches framed
2020
Ink and wood stain on paper
24 x 34 inches
27.75 x 38.75 inches framed
Penumbral Eclipse
Three Moons
2018
Ink and wood stain on paper
10 x 23.75 inches
14.75 x 27.75 inches framed
Quiet Stars
2020
Ink, wood stain on paper
7 x 7 inches
11 x 11 inches framed
Fires In Space
2020
Ink, wood stain on paper
7 x 7 inches
11 x 11 inches framed
Worlds In Collision
2022
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
10.25 x 24 inches
13.75 x 27.375 inches framed
Twin Stars
2017
Ink and wood stain on paper
15.5 x 15.5 inches
18.75 x 18.75 inches framed
Free Floating Planets
2016
Ink and wood stain on paper
24 x 24 inches
27.5 x 27.5 inches framed
No Longer On The Map III
2022
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.5 x 13.875 inches framed
Star
2017
Axis II
Ink, wood stain on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.25 x 14.25 inches framed
First Morning 2022
Ink, wood stain on paper
7 x 7 inches
11 x 11 inches framed
Star Spangled
2016
Ink and wood stain on paper
23.75 x 10.75 inches
27.25 x 14.25 inches framed
Time Slings I
2020
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.5 x 13.875 inches framed
Passarim
2020
Ink, wood stain on paper
7 x 7 inches
11 x 11 inches framed
Yellowstone I
2022
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.5 x 13.875 inches framed
Evening
2022
Star II
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.5 x 13.875 inches framed
Three Times Over 2018
Time Slings II
2022
Ink, wood stain, pigments, acrylic on paper
24 x 10.25 inches
27.5 x 13.875 inches framed
Coyote Nebula 2020
Ink, pigment and wood stain on paper
55 x 55 inches
