Work samples
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La destrucción de la destrucción
Directed, edited, and starred in an experimental short film.
Music scored by John Winfred II
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Becoming I
Directed, edited, and starred.
Music score by John Winfred II
About Maria
María Sánchez is a designer, educator, filmmaker, and multimedia artist from Caracas, Venezuela. Her work is an investigation based on the process of transmitting both the presence and absence of her body through technological devices and natural materials. Using multiple mediums such as digital video, sculpture, performance, and installation, she is exploring the semiotics of her body, whether on the basis of identity, gender, ethnicity or spirituality.
Sánchez has a Graphic Design… more
Virgin Birth
The project Virgin Birth is a reflection on the predestined purpose when you are defined as a woman. In this installation, a POV video loop projects on top of terra-cotta shrines that contain sculptures of fetuses. The video loop shows a woman sitting down with open thighs, dressed in all white, her hands with red nail polish that deteriorates as the video progresses. The position of the camera is as if the viewer is the one giving birth, or as if this figure is a machine with the head as a camera. The power of fertility and the consequences of having a body that can produce - or is meant - to produce is seen through sculptures that resemble a fetus. The sculptures are made out of mirror, wire, my hair, stone beads that resemble teeth, and charcoal. Touching on the concepts of domestication and reproduction, this figure is meant to give birth when the fetus appears on her hands, then placing it inside the terracotta shrine. The creation of the terracotta clay shrines are inspired by la Venus de Tacarigua, a Venezuelan pre-columbian figure that symbolizes sexuality and fertility, and Hannah Wilke, “Five Androgynous and Vaginal Sculptures,” 1960-61.The materials used to form the fetuses become a continuation of herself, leaving a trace, an essence. Repetition and multiplication become a routine to the figure without an end on her destiny to reproduce as much as possible.
Woman as Other
Subject as Other, II
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Subject as Other, II
Metal wire, mirrors, my hair, plaster, charcoal, stone and glass beads, 2024.
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Subject as Object, II
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Subject as Object, II (detail)
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Subject as Other, II (detail)
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Subject as Other, II (detail)
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Subject as Other, II (detail)
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Subject as Other, II (detail)
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Subject as Other, II (detail from installation)