Maria Varela
Rugs of Life, 2020
Installation, two handmade rugs (185 × 103 cm and 191 × 91 cm), black & white video, no sound, 5′ loop
Produced in collaboration with the Twanza Cooperative
Courtesy of the artist
Maria Varela’s work Rugs of Life (2020) has as a starting point the patterns woven into the traditional rugs of the Amazigh tribe of Morocco. The work attempts to reframe these elements by presenting a new typology of weaving patterns. A deconstruction of the archetypal symbols begins under the “Game of Life” algorithm proposed by the mathematician John Horton Conway, to subsequently evolve and transform following new generations of algorithms. Traditional symbols convert into organic entities, with each new generation encompassing the previous, just like tradition itself evolves from generation to generation; indeed, ‘generative’ algorithms and ‘generation’ share a common etymology. The new patterns are collected in a glossary distributed to the Tawnza Cooperative, a women’s weaving art cooperative in Morocco’s region of the Ait Hamza valley. The weavers were asked to draw on their long-term experience to intuitively create new compositions using the deconstructed patterns.
The Tawnza Cooperative was founded to enable women to achieve a sustainable income and independence from the male intermediaries who trade in traditional rugs.
Biography
Maria Varela lives and works in Athens and Florina, Greece. She is a visual artist and Assistant Professor at the Florina School of Fine Arts. Her work focuses on creative applications of new technologies, textile data visualisation, and collaborative production in women’s communities. She is exploring different methods to transcribe the archival event from the digital environment to the physical world. Through the creation of various digital and physical artefacts, systems, and events, she delves into concepts such as identity, memory, tradition, and their construction. Group exhibitions (selected): Plásmata II, Onassis Stegi, Ioannina (2023); Circular Cultures, Milano Design Week, Onassis Stegi – British Council, Milan (2023); Ηandmade, EMΣΤ – Schwarz Foundation – Art Space Pythagorion, Samos (2023); Statecraft, EMΣΤ, Athens (2022); The Εvent of a Τhread, Metropolitan Organisation of Museums of Visual Arts of Thessaloniki – MΟΜus, Thessaloniki (2022); 19th Contemporary Art Festival Sesc_Videobrasil, Sesc Pompeia, São Paulo (2015); 16th International Media Art Biennale WRO, Wroclaw (2015); No Country for Young Men, Bozar Palais de Beaux Art, Brussels (2014); future past – past future, transmediale, Berlin (2014); Afresh, ΕΜΣΤ, Athens (2013); Visual Dialogues, Onassis Stegi, Athens (2013). In 2021, she received the Selected Art Award from the Taoyuan Museum of Fine Arts in Taiwan.
ALL WORKS
- Phantom Investigations (Giannis Delagrammatikas, Ino Varvariti). Each Relation Belongs to Other Relations
- Chryssa. From the Newspaper Book
- Chryssa. From the Newspaper Book
- Nausica Pastra. Analogiques
- Nausica Pastra. Synectron–Square–Circle
- Bia Davou. Pillars and Clouds, Hypothetical Intervention in the Pillars of Olympic Zeus
- Bia Davou. Serial Structures 2 – Odyssey
- Christina Mitrentse. European Union – Bookscape XIV
- Christina Mitrentse. Home is the Net – Bookscape VI
- Karolina Krasouli. Pattern (Νοs. 1–3, 5–9, 11–14)
- Karolina Krasouli. How to Remember (Plans)
- Chrysanthi Koumianaki. When the Performance Ends
- Maria Varela. Rugs of Life
