Following the exhibition Blackness, held in March at the Karas Gallery, academic painter Mia Maraković will show her “black” and “white” paintings to the audience for the first time as part of the exhibition Black, White and the Red Line, to be held on 12 July at the Josip Račić Gallery. These are the artist’s recent works, specifically, two polyptychs of monumental dimensions in mixed media, which continue on the black paintings from her previous series. The exhibition, on display until the end of August, is accompanied by a bilingual catalogue in Croatian and English with an essay by art historian and author of the exhibition Tihana Galić in which she writes: … The paintress has chosen red for the line that cuts through the monochrome, the symbolism of which is deeply connected to the secret of life. Red is a symbol of fire and blood. Blood is the source of life, but shed blood also means death. Red line is the link between white and black canvases, by which the artist tries to create a symbolic link between life and death. These are lines that delineate a world much larger than a painting canvas – a world of human psyche, human fears and human expectations. …
Mia Maraković graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb in 2018, where she also earned an MFA degree. Since 2014, she has been active on the art scene and has so far staged 16 solo exhibitions in Zagreb, Karlovac, Kutina and Leipzig. She has also participated at around eighty juried group exhibitions in Croatia and abroad.
In 2016, she was the recipient of the Rector’s Award for her project Life Beneath the Sun, in 2017 she won a special award at the exhibition Student International Art Biennial (in Macedonia), and in 2018 she was awarded the third prize by the Rovinj Heritage Museum. Also in 2018, she received a Commendation from the Academic Council as the most successful student in the academic year 2017/2018.
She has created three temporary public installations: The Tree of Plenty, Tunnel of Good Wishes in 2016 and Comb Me, realized at the Fourth International Conference in Expressive Arts Therapy and Training at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, 2018.
Photo: from the Mia Maraković's exhibition set-up at the Josip Račić Gallery. Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb, 2022