Masha Maroz

Statement

In her artistic and research practice Masha Maroz explores the historical Belarusian context through the lens of synthetics between the archaic forms and technologies assuming the transformative potential of traditional culture in the dominant socio-political matrix. Inspired by quantum physics, Oriental philosophy and the ancient worldview of the Slavs, the artist sees affinity connections between these forms of knowledge.

Maroz is a founder and curator of the Past Perfect platform, dedicated to the preservation and popularization of the ethnographic heritage of Belarus. Expeditions to the Polesia region are an important part of her research. With an interest in crafts, material and image-making she uses a diverse array of disciplines to develop her language through different artistic forms: installations, textiles, photography, analog and digital graphics, objects.

GlogauAIR Project

From 2018 to the present day I’m working on a monograph researching the status of modern ritual veneration of roadside crosses of Palesse region. I traveled thousands of kilometers across Belarus, visited hundreds of villages and captured more then 430 crosses.

These crosses are a phenomenon of material and spiritual culture, which contains important evidence of the ethnic history of Belarus. They are excellent examples of traditional art, which often still reflect the experience of entire groups of woodcarvers, weavers, embroiderers, and blacksmiths. This alive tradition acquires new and more specific features every year, transforming under the pressure of time. Bearers of ancient knowledge, craftswomen and masters are leaving this world, and the collective experience manifests itself with new forms.

Installation, Object, and Photography

CV Summary

Education

• Graduated from the Belarusian State Academy of Arts (2014) as a costume designer.

Solo Shows

• 2020 “Long Way Home”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus

Selected Group Shows

• 2022 “Good as Hell: Voicing Resistance”, National Gallery Of Kosovo, within Manifesta 14, Prishtina, Kosovo
• 2022 “When The Sun Is Low – The Shadows Are Long”, GfZK Gallery, Leipzig, Germany
• 2022 “Home That Doesn’t Exist”, International Festival of Photography (within Month Of Photography In Minsk), OFF Piotrkowska Center, Lodz, Poland
• 2022 “Fight Like A Girl”, Kunsttraject, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2022 “So Far Yet So Close”, De Balie, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2022 “So Far Yet So Close”, Arti Et Amicitiae, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2022 “When The Sun Is Low – The Shadows Are Long”, Arsenal Gallery, Bialostok, Poland
• 2022 “The Code of Presence: Belarusian Protest Embroideries and Textile Patterns”, University of Michigan Library (virtual exhibition), Michigan, United States
• 2021 “When forms become attitudes”, Fundacja Villa Socrates, Krynki, Poland
• 2021 “Screams of the Silenced”, The Gray Space in the Middle, The Hague, The Netherlands
• 2021 “Voices of Belarus. Chapter two: Restoring Connections”, Punt WG, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2021 “Voices of Belarus”, Rietveld Pavilion, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2021 “Farewell Of Season”, Concetto Di Casa, Minsk, Belarus
• 2020 “Vocabulary Of Polesia”, Kult. center “Korpus”, Minsk, Belarus
• 2020 “Grain And Chrysalis”, Zerno, Minsk, Belarus
• 2020 “Heart Of The Birdwatcher”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus
• 2019 “Anthology Of Holiday”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus
• 2019 “Running With Scissors”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus
• 2018 “Non-Fashion. Chapter two”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus
• 2018 “More Color Project”, Palace of Art, Мinsk, Belarus
• 2017 “Inside side”, Museum of the History of Minsk, Minsk, Belarus
• 2016 “Nоn-Fashion”, National Center of Contemporary Arts, Minsk, Belarus
• 2015 “The 70th anniversary of the founding of Belarusian State Academy of Arts”, Palace of Art, Minsk, Belarus
• 2013 “Dual”, Expoforum, Saint Petersburg, Russia
• 2012 “Origins”, gallery of Belarusian State Academy of Arts, Minsk, Belarus

Gallery