Maria Klabin

Maria Klabin's work delves into scenes, occurrences, and landscapes that are deeply woven into everyday life, exploring themes that are both familiar and frequently experienced.

Biography of Maria Klabin

Maria Klabin was born in 1978 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She studied Visual Arts and Art History at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, where she was awarded the Susan May Green Award for painting. In 2002, she earned an MA from Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, in the UK. Throughout her academic journey, Klabin honed her skills and developed a distinct artistic voice.

In 2011, the artist received the Prêmio Pipa from the Instituto Pipa in Rio de Janeiro.

Klabin has exhibited her work extensively both in Brazil and internationally. Her exhibitions include solo and group shows in prominent galleries and cultural institutions. Notable solo exhibitions include "Liquid Air" at Nara Roesler in New York (2022), "Entre Rio e Pedra" at Galeria Silvia Cintra in Rio de Janeiro (2017), "e o dia havia acabado quando começou" at Galeria Silvia Cintra in Rio de Janeiro (2014), and many more.

Klabin's paintings have been featured in numerous group shows, including "Aberto 02" at Casa Villanova Artigas in São Paulo (2023), "Abrasive Paradise" at Kunsthal KADE in Amstersfoort (2022), "Aberto 01" at Casa Niemeyer in São Paulo (2022), "Cross-cuts" at Nara Roesler in New York (2021), among others.

Currently, the artist lives and works in Rio de Janeiro. 

Maria Klabin's Art Style

In her exploration of omnipresent elements, Klabin captures the cadence of their recurrence, seeking to unveil the formal rhythm within their repetition or banality. Her artistic process involves continuously producing and assembling drawings, photographs, and annotations inspired by her immediate surroundings. 

Maria Klabin navigates between extremes in the scale of her artworks, creating both petite and monumental, large-scale paintings depending on the subject matter. Her small canvases often act as a platform for swift streams of thought, akin to jotting on paper, perhaps tapping into the subconscious, adeptly capturing the pulse of her environment. Conversely, her large pieces embody a more contemplative, dreamlike perspective.

In her latest endeavors, Klabin has crafted a series of expansive landscape paintings, nearly mural-sized, which draw from fragments of autobiographical elements. These pieces are distilled from what she describes as an improbable and fluid patchwork of memory, resulting in compositions that are both captivating and daunting, defying easy objectification.