An Artist with a Millennial’s Eye and Old Master’s Hand

Russian-born Maria Kreyn and Heist gallery will present an exhibition of both new and existing paintings and drawings that track Maria’s documentation of intimate moments.

The show will take place from 10-26 May at the Welsh Chapel in London, a Grade II listed, former Presbyterian church that retains much of its original 19th century architecture.

An Artist with a Millennial’s Eye and Old Master’s Hand

Maria Kreyn wants to get us back in the room together, communicating, talking and looking at one another. The artist has captured a series of compositions, remixing the techniques of the Renaissance, Baroque and Romantic eras of art history for the present day. Her paintings suggest that we need to turn towards, rather than away from the people in our lives. In creating a body of work that captures intimate moments, she addresses the anxieties that come as a part of intimacy, and that in the end, facing these difficulties nurtures healthy relationships. Kreyn’s paintings ache with reality. She blends the techniques of Old Masters to illustrate life’s eternal contemporaneous aspect despite where it falls on the timeline.

Maria loved the classics. Her mother is a classical pianist, so she grew up making sketches, sitting underneath the piano, listening to Rachmaninov. While studying in Norway as a painters apprentice Maria was ever-drawn to the use of old tropes and stories. She observed the execution of the painter and his students before laying paintbrush to canvas herself. When she did start to paint her own subject matter, she riffed on the old masters to tell her own stories, which she calls ‘subtly ambiguous and open-ended, remaking them into new allegorical mash-ups.’

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When asked why 
she chose classical painting, instead of a more contemporary, conceptual approach, she explains,

‘I think the forms are really beautiful and it’s the best way to create emotional resonance. There’s no chronology in art. I’m as much a product of the future as I am of the past. A sense of intimacy is certainly something I aim to create. 
In a chaotic, increasingly technological world, I’d like to create a deep and complex private space that stirs the heart.
 Intimacy can be very ambiguous, can hold
a lot of contradictory feelings, and so I try 
to capture that as well.’

A series of resonant art talks, sound baths and audio-installations composed by David Triana will be ongoing during the exhibition of Maria’s work at Welsh Chapel.

When & Where: 10 – 26 May 2018, Welsh Chapel,
 136 Shaftesbury Ave London
WC2H 8HB

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