Bellas Artes has represented Colombian artist Olga de Amaral since 1986. de Amaral’s lush tapestries constructed of linen and cotton elements, drenched in gold and silver leaf, have established her as a truly original and gifted artist.

Her exhibition at the gallery this summer will feature three dimensional works, Nudos (knots). The knots represent an expressive new pathway in the artist’s oeuvre. Nudos expands the luminous and shaded nuances of de Amaral’s architectural tapestries and extends her intention of “turning textiles into golden surfaces of light.” The “golden surfaces of light” come full circle in the nudos by creating a tactile and sensual poetry that sculpts form and radiance in three dimensions. Each knot is made of 5,000 threads, 10 yards long, weighing two pounds. After layers of gesso and golden paint have been applied to each strand, the resulting form weighs fifty five pounds–an unexpected transformation.

The threads are weighted and grounded by the gesso, bonding them to the material realm and the substance of the earth. Yet the golden surfaces bring forth luminance, lifting the forms to an ethereal realm. This presents a paradox–an invented reality that fuses the material and the spiritual. The spatial environment that is brought forth immerses us simultaneously in a glow of tangible beauty and a sphere of meditative inner calm and peace that personifies de Amaral’s words, “shining odes to humanness and infinity.”

de Amaral’s work is in the collections of museums throughout the world. These include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Modern Art, and The Museum of Arts and Design in New York, Art Institute of Chicago, de Young Museum in San Francisco, Art Museum of the Americas and National Museum of American Art, Renwick Gallery, in Washington, DC, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Cleveland Museum of Art, The Contemporary Museum in Honolulu, Denver Art Museum. Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Museo de Arte Moderno in Bogota, National Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Musée Bellerive in Zurich, and Museo del Instituto de Arte Contemporaneo,Lima.

The artist was selected as the 2005 Artist Visionary! by the Museum of Arts and Design in New York. Notable installations by the artist include three large 10’H x 8’ W tapestries hanging on a marble wall in the atrium of the Four Seasons Hotel in Hong Kong and Field of Stelae acquired by BGC International for the atrium of its London Headquarters. Field of Stelae is composed of 22 suspended sculptures. Reminiscent of ancient standing stones, the abstract vertical shapes illuminate the surroundings with their gold and silver surfaces.