Ashes to Art
Ashes to Art
by Maria Kastan
Titles:
1. “Just 7 Steps” / ash, charcoal on paper / 30 x 23 inches / 2020
2. “Across the World” / ash, charcoal on paper / 30 x 23 inches / 2020
3. “Made of Star Stuff” / ash, charcoal on paper / 30 x 23 inches / 2020
4. “Continuum 1” / ash, charcoal on paper / 30 x 23 inches / 2020
5. “Hold Still” / charcoal on paper / 5 x 4 inches / 2020
6. “Hope on the back of a fish” / charcoal on paper / 5 x 4 inches / 2020
7. “No Flights” / charcoal on paper / 5 x 4 inches / 2020
Artists Statement
At the start of quarantine facing our world, I was unable to work in my studio. For several weeks I paced, entered my studio and left, only to return to center around family as many of the world also did. I watched, listened and reflected in front of many a fire during those weeks. Trying to warm up, I watched the fire cool and began running my hands thru the cool charcoal and ashes that had remained. It was in that moment that those ashes became the material for my drawings. I was able to work again.
About Maria Kastan
Maria Kastan is a mixed media artist—oil painting, assemblage sculpture, drawings and digitally manipulated art. Much of her work nods towards the figure in relationship to the natural and the manmade. Oftentimes, her studio is full of foraged materials, plumbing supplies, oil paint and paper. Kastan’s recurring themes of freedom and containment, strength and weakness, falling and searching are constant in all of her work. The ever changing person—complex, in quiet movement, incognito.
Maria Kastan has shown her work nationally and internationally—Arad Biennial, Romania, and collected by institutions such as MIDAC Contemporary Art Museum, Italy, Brooklyn College CUNY Library and The Brooklyn Art Library, Brooklyn, New York.
Email: mariakastan@yahoo.com
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Website: www.kastan.com