AmberMaida's reception at Black Rock Gallery. Amber is on the right. Flowers by Robert Valle. Inspiration by David Bowie.
The Gallery at Black Rock held its reception for Amber Maida’s solo show, Labyrinth, last evening.
The rooms were packed with guests and alive with conversation and music, sparked no doubt by the amazing mixed-media abstracts hung on the walls. And the music of David Bowie, which inspired it.
I finally got to meet Amber, who was so charming and lovely (the word “goddess” comes to mind). She was more like someone a movie producer would cast as an artist. Let me stop now before I start gushing.
I had seen Amber’s work at the White Space Gallery in New Haven, at Crescent Avenue’s show and at the designer show house in Weston last year, but to see her pieces grouped in a solo show, dominating two rooms, is something else.
The works were intricately layered, earthy and intense. Her artist’s statement says it all. There is a tension in the work that gives it power, but also beauty. Her contrasting imagery in the end conveys peace and harmony, and that’s quite a feat.
The show closes July 23.
I am an editor and designer who has also worked as a cartoonist, illustrator, writer and educator. I mix observations on the overlapping topics of design, culture and society, particularly in Connecticut. Or I just prattle on about life in general. 
