Maria Beykirch’s drawings and paintings are imbued with multiple layers of meaning. Words and digits lie concealed within intricate compositions, gradually conjuring in the eyes and minds of viewers an infinite succession of lush imaginary worlds. The first book to focus on Beykirch’s work, Maria Beykirch: Paper Dances brings together fifty of the artist’s drawings and paintings created over the past ten years. Under the guidance of the Austrian artist Giselbert Hoke, Beykirch has developed a distinctive gouache technique that she uses in the creation of her densely textured, multilayered works. By turns full of movement—reflecting the artist’s formal training as a dancer—and demonstrative of a contemplative longing for deep meditative peace, Beykirch’s work is suffused with her poetic visions of personally meaningful people and places. Beykirch’s drawings and paintings of unusual expressive power already enjoy acclaim in her native Germany, and this book introduces her work to a new audience.
