Maria Pask is a Welsh artist who lives and works in Amsterdam. Her art primarily focuses on processes and includes people from a wide variety of societal groups. Based on artistic strategies developed for the most part during the 1960s, the artist’s works are reminiscent of the radical nature of the alternative movement. Her installation works interpret the nature of collective creativity, empowerment, and the live moment. Working with open formats and social structures, her works have been described as a ‘cocktail of social commentary, political doctrine, ecological soundings, philosophy, feminism, body politics, and religion.’
A few years ago, Pask began transitioning from performance to painting as a result of an urgent need to cope with personal struggles. Going back to drawing and painting meant going back to the earliest stage of her artistic practice; nevertheless, they provide her with a sense of immediacy that prevents unnecessary mediation. The images that are unleashed in her mind are directly transferred onto canvas, and so is the text, just like a medium intercedes between the spirits and the living.
The notion of reciprocity is central to Maria Pask’s current artistic practice. Her recent projects are centered on working as an artist in a service-based role within local communities in Amsterdam. The artist creates collaborative scenarios through which to examine themes of collective creativity, empowerment, and community service. Whether performance or installation, each of her works come to be shaped by shared experience, through which to foster an openness to difference and change.
Maria Pask received has performed and exhibited internationally at institutions including Kunstinstituut Melly (as part of The Hartwig Art Production Fund); NEST, The Hague; Centraal Museum, Utrecht; Museum of Modern Art, Oxford; Athens Biennale, Greece; White Columns, New York City; W139, Amsterdam; Münster Sculpture Project, Germany; If I Can’t Dance I Don’t Want to Be Part of Your Revolution, Amsterdam; Frankfurter Kunstverein, Germany; BAK, Utrecht; De Appel, Amsterdam and Moderna Galerija, Ljubljana.