Artist’s Statement: My latest painting has been informed by experiences of a spiritual nature, such as dreams, lucid dreaming, visions, and their inspiring interconnections. After my studies of art and design in New York, my interests led me toward investigations of the major comparative religions and their history and philosophy, as well as toward the study of various indigenous religions and shamanism.
In search for a cohesive framework for my diverse interests, I was lucky to come across the teachings of the Integral Institute and an associated Evolutionary Collective, located in Colorado and California respectively. Their fresh and clear ideas helped me put together a coherent”backpack” from my up-to-date findings and pointed me toward the course of my future journey.
Presently, I am most interested in the contemporary trend of merging the insights and findings from traditionally separate fields of art, sciences and spirituality. I hope you will find some of this represented in my recent paintings. Please feel free to find your own interpretations according to your experiences.
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Magdalena Mraz was born in the Czech Republic. Her early interest in art found focus in her studies of painting and sculpture at the Industrial School for Ceramics in Karlovy Vary, Czechoslovakia. In 1967, her family emigrated to the US and after a short interruption, Magda was able to continue her education at Queens College in New York City, where she earned her B.A. and M.F.A. degrees.
After her graduation, Magda used used her skills and qualification in the fields of textile, stage design and illustration, as well as in her teaching jobs. Her original textile designs created with silk and dye were featured in The New York Times, Vogue, Mademoiselle, Harper’s Bazaar and purchased by Ralph Lauren, Liz Claiborne, Dan River and Spring Mills. Her children’s books’ illustrations in appeared in Macmillan and Doubleday publications, and she participated in set designs for the Columbia University School of Film.
In her teaching, Magda combined the interesting presentation style with her ability to motivate and inspire students on all levels. In her classes they learned how to use the charcoal, pastels, watercolors, oil and acrylic paints, as well as clay, fabric and papier mache. She also introduced them to the artists and styles of various historical periods and encouraged them to express their individual creativity.
Magda’s spiritual interests led her to further studies at Wisdom University in San Francisco, CA, where she received her Doctorate in Ministry in 2008. In her dissertation she was able to combine her creative skills with her studies in comparative religion, basing her paintings of the Egyptian Creation Story on the underpinning of the sacred geometry. In her subsequent lectures she was striving to integrate her observations from the art field with art history, social studies and spirituality, in order to bring to focus their inseparable relationship.
While pursuing her various practical careers, Magda also continued to develop her personal painting style and philosophy. She has displayed her work in numerous art shows in the US and abroad. From the outset, her work has been a spiritual quest into the nature of our consciousness and the purpose of our lives. In her artwork, the transient reality of our existence is brought to focus by painted or sculpted figures attempting to escape the limitations of their physical boundaries.
Although the artist’s search for both freedom and stability has been underscored by her youth spent under the totalitarian regime of the former Czechoslovakia, eventually a more profound search for spiritual liberation seemed to be taking place. Her nine large scale triptychs on the theme of the carnival represent the allegory of the human journey, from the bondage to the carnal aspect of our existence to the spiritual liberation.
The theme of gradual evolution of the human spirit toward greater liberty is further explored in the group of seven large paintings based on the sacred geometry, which permeates all creation in our universe, including the structures of our consciousness. Each painting represents the subsequent, geometrically as well as symbolically more complex stages of human development from number one to seven. Such process can take place on the personal as well the collective level. With the assurance of the cosmic geometry permeating all universe, the flight to freedom becomes less terrifying.
Magda’s latest group of smaller paintings seems to offer us such freedom from the fear of flying through the vast space of cosmos into the new dimensions of our existence. Her compositions suggest the interconnections between all matter and processes in nature, on earth and throughout the universe. Yet each liberation can also lead to a higher stage of new realization and increased harmony. Several of Magda’s paintings suggest the human capacity to create heaven on earth because the structure of sacred or perfect geometry is already embedded in our consciousness.
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