Maria Positano GBA

Maria has just graduated from The Royal College of Arts, completing a Masters Degree, summer 2023, with excellence across theoretical and practical aspects of their degree. Their work has been shown internationally and acquired in private collections in the UK and Italy, some of which include Collezione 54, Milan, IT and Prometeo Gallery’s own private collection, Milan. IT. Positano is this year’s awardee of the Gilbert Bayes Award 2023, Royal Society of Sculptors and the STC x RCA Air 2023, a 1 year artist in residence solo award at South Thames College and was invited to take part in various international artist in residency programs. A few examples include Mason&Fifth x Hyphastudios, London UK and ViaFarini.org in Milan, IT. 

Maria's often starts working by looking at Greco Roman armour suits; with particular interest in the current dynamics of warfare, armour is seen as its prototype and is used by the artist to comment on its inherent values. Historically, armor has been associated with militarism and conquest, symbolising the power and authority of those who possess it. In the context of gender dynamics, this metaphor reflects on the ways in which patriarchal structures perpetuate violence and subjugation, reinforcing hierarchies of power and privilege. The artist believes that challenging and dismantling the metaphorical armor requires addressing the underlying values that it embodies. By crafting armor from paper pulp and up cycled fabrics and clay, the artist subverts expectations of strength and durability associated with conventional armor, furthermore treating the surface to age the materials, making them feel fragile. Instead of relying on physical toughness, the wearer must rely on alternative forms of resilience and adaptability. These body-like hybrids can be seen as different declinations of the artist’s individuality. By queering materials Positano is reimagining their connotations and uses in order to challenge narratives, reinterpreting the meanings and symbolism associated with those materials, all the while creating seductive material illusions. Paper, typically associated with fragility and temporality, is transformed into a form of protection, inviting a reevaluation of what constitutes strength and resilience, challenging binary notions of vulnerability and invulnerability. These ‘reversed armours’ become anthropomorphic bodies and are often gender ambiguous, breasts and legs become protection and armour, reconfiguring the body anatomy itself. The artist sees the practice as a metaphorical exploration of authenticity, vulnerability, and resistance, inviting individuals to assert their agency and reclaim their narratives in the world. Positano works on a sense of humanity in the work, aiming for the viewer to experience the sculptures through their body image, often encourages through mirroring the scale of the body itself.