Marea Reed
What a sleep, what a breath (Sleeping Ariadne), 2024
Archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Gloss Art Fibre Warmtone 300gsm
Height 76 cm x Width 61 cm
Artwork is framed and ready to hang & comes with certificate of authenticity
Description: On the island of Naxos, according to Virgil, Ariadne, princess of Crete, fell asleep in a cave, oblivious to her abandonment by Theseus, with whom she had fled Crete after helping him slay the half-bull, half-man monster, the Minotaur. Here, she is depicted at the moment she is discovered by Dionysius, God of wine and pleasure, who falls in love with her beauty, as she lies in deep and contented slumber in this charming grotto.
Artist Bio:
Marea's distinctive photomedia practice creates open-ended, cinestill-like narratives, often in Arcadian settings, as metaphors for fernweh – or 'farsickness' – a desire to escape to real or imagined places or times – that is at once personal and universal.
Believing in the profound effect of immediate environment upon the psyche, her work explores the intangible threshold between what is seen and what is felt, and considers how these unbiddable responses might materialise, while allowing viewers their own instinctive responses to the story.
Influenced by both the Old Masters and cinematography, she is especially interested in the elusive space between the natural and metaphysical worlds. Her deeply saturated, time-less imagery simultaneously embraces the panoramic and the intimate, suggesting that even the widest landscape can contain intensely private realms; and reflecting the Sublime's concepts of interconnectedness, imminence and the infinite.
Graduating with a BFA in Photomedia from the National Art School in 2022, Marea's work has featured in numerous domestic and international competitions, and been exhibited around Australia, as well as Germany, Spain, and the USA, with works held in private collections in the UK, USA, New Zealand and Australia.