Marianne Maric

Marianne Maric reclaims the famous line from Statues Also Die, turning its logic on its head: here, statues come back to life. In her photographic series, nude or semi-nude women physically engage with marble and bronze figures in scenes that are acrobatic, playful, and sensuous. The living touch appears to awaken the cold stone, evoking agalmatophilia, the erotic attraction to statues. As neurologist and historian Laura Bossi suggests, the line between aesthetic admiration and fetishistic passion is often blurred. Drawing on the myth of Pygmalion, Maric blurs boundaries between art and life. Her models, frozen by the camera’s flash, seem to become statues themselves. Through this visual tension, Maric probes the role of the model: mere object of desire or an agent in her own right? In her work, the model emerges as a double figure, both desiring and desired, challenging established categories of art and gaze.