Marta Luz Serra-Jovenich Gallery

In an attempt to fly, Marta leap off a balcony at her home in Columbia at the age of five, and began an early career as an artist while recovering. With her wings clipped (temporarily) a world of color opened up to her, when she received a set of Prismacolor pencils.

Marta's family later moved to Miami, Florida, where she studied photography and painting at the Pratt Institute. With "wings" fully recovered, landing Marta gracefully in New York, her style flourished. Artistic influences were felt by Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, Andy Warhol, Frieda Kahlo and Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Artist Marta in speaking about her art, "The paintings I present came out of my love for photography. I started by using personal photographs from my family album that depicted a time, a place and a family life in South America.

Later on, I started to paint New York Street scenes, using photographs that I took during my days as a street photographer. Most recent, I have appropriated religious imagery from the Old Masters to recreate and re-invent these characters. My attempt is to give new expression to an old image and bring into it a new light.

The photographs or images I select to paint are triggered by some element that makes me want to paint it, it can be a small gesture, an article of clothing, a facial expression or a simple obsessive feeling that makes me want to see that image turned into a painting.

After I have the image on canvas, I like to have fun with the process by using a variety of materials to create light, and give it lots of texture and color. The materials I use in my paintings consist of a variety pencils, markers, pastels, and gold leaf. For textures, I use papers, magazine images, fabrics, plastics and glitters to name a few. In the end the painting becomes a sort of collage as well."

Discovering the art website of Marta's was like reading a book I couldn't put down. Drawn by the rich colors and subjects, each gallery was a page eagerly waiting to be turned, and then I cheated and went to the end, only to backtrack to the beginning, so that I could work my way way through to the end again. I'm sure you will be equally delighted to visit the online gallery of: