Eva-Marie Amiya

Artist Statement

My current work is a series of photographs and mixed media pieces that deal with women and aging. My perspective is how we perceive ourselves mentally as we age and the changes in our physical bodies. Through this exploration, I have been delicately and sometimes not so delicately pushing the viewer to challenge the why. Why must women feel the pressure to stay young? Why must we change and augment our bodies and faces to be valued among our circle of friends, spouses, and the general public? Even if this is all in our minds.

I approach my current and past themes with passion and intrigue, mixed with some historical or religious context. I am constantly trying to push my boundaries, as well as push societal boundaries through my artwork. On occasion, I do also give myself license to make beautiful and peaceful imagery as we are all influenced by our surroundings.

Biography

For as long as Eva-Marie can remember she has always been an artist. As a small child in the suburbs of Philadelphia, she would dig shallow holes all around the sideyard to arrange flowers to be delicately arranged under small pieces of glass. Serving aslittle windows of nature and otherworldly to her, they pulled her away from reality even for just a fleeting moment. Photography entered shortly after with a small point-and-shoot plastic 35mm camera. With it she stalking her cat around her family's backyard taking photos of her cat from the low-angle grass level. In High School, Eva-Marie had an extraordinary art teacher named Jo Yost who exposed her to various mediums and styles during field trips to SoHo NYC. Her excitement and enthusiasm reflecting on these introductions to a variety of SoHo artists were palpable.

College brought Eva-Marie to Southern California where she studied Fashion Merchandising and Design at Brooks College. She then briefly daddled in the fashion world as an assistant to a designer and a buyer for a shoe department. After a bit of deliberation, she decided to return to college to study International Finance with a specialty in Art and Antiquities. This is when she began to explore metalsmithing/silversmithing, life sculpture & life drawing, and fine art photography. For her, fine art photography was a game changer. It became a visual language that enabled Eva-Marie to fully express her deepest thoughts hidden in the recesses of her mind and her dreams. Photography has allowed her an outlet to express fragments of her personal self symbolicaly while drawing on her past studies in art history and theology.

Exhibition History (CV)