Through forms that exist between the figurative and abstract, Anna Pietrzak seeks to capture moments of instability, unrest, vulnerability, and precariousness, to expose how tensions carried internally within herself manifest as outward gestures worn on her body. The honesty of these expressions is sometimes more revealing than the words meant to explain them. When body language does not match verbal prose, intuitively she believes how someone seems rather than what they say. She shapes forms which lean, press, and resist the picture frame. Gold leaf is used, not as an embellishment, but as the primary medium of the work. It too carries this tension as a paradox of something that was once unbearably heavy, now made impossibly light. She continues to explore these themes and expand her investigation into other media, including raw pigments, where potent, embedded emotions within color are uncontained, expansive, and exposed.
Anna Pietrzak (b. 1987) is based in New York City. With a background in architecture, her work depicts forms exploring weight and tension. Her paintings use gold leaf and raw pigments as primary mediums. Her work has been exhibited and collected internationally and has been featured in several publications.