Amber Maida show opens Friday at Gallery at Black Rock

The Gallery at Black Rock
2861 Fairfield Ave., Bridgeport, (203) 814-6856
Amber Maida: A Labyrinth Line Existence
June 4—July 23, 2010
Artist reception: Fri., June 4, 6—9 p.m.

Press release

If you like David Bowie, chances are you'll like the new Labyrinth solo show at the Gallery at Black Rock. The show opens with a reception for the artist, Amber Maida, on Fri., June 4, from 6—9 p.m.

Anyone who went to the White Space Gallery when it was on Chapel Street in New Haven has seen Maida's work hanging by Dali's.

The Naugatuck artist's work has been featured in Art World News Magazine (September 2009) and Ink magazine (January 2008). A suite of her paintings were selected by Richard's of Greenwich for the 2009 Art to the Avenue exhibition in Greenwich. Her work has also been in juried exhibitions at AIRS in New Haven, the Housatonic Museum of Art, the Silvermine Guild of Art in New Canaan and Lazy Pear Gallery in Montpelier, VT.

Her new body of work, A Labyrinth Line Existence, alludes to a quote from David Bowie's interview on the 1993 Black Tie White Noise film. She plays Bowie's music often while in the studio. "Bowie has been a strong influence on my work, which has developed into a visual vocabulary on the canvas," Maida says.

The work is simply stunning, particularly her mixed-media paintings.

"I create tactile counter-environments that express myth and uncover the mystery hidden within reality," Maida explains. "I juxtapose dualities—fragility/strength, ancient/contemporary, external/internal—to exploit a tension..."

"My materials are carefully chosen and strongly symbolic," Maida continues. "My work contains recurring motifs and materials including golden labyrinths, fluid backdrops, crackled textures, vintage books, silks, feathers, eggshells, and line drawings of suspended worlds. I hope that my images take viewers deeper within their own realm of realization."