Maria Molteni:Heart of Stone

PRACTICE Gallery is pleased to present the work of Massachusetts based Artist Maria Molteni.
On view through Sunday April 27th, 2025
2-6 PM – Saturday and Sunday
Heart of Stone builds upon an ongoing project called Counting to Infinity (Contando all’Infinito) and a body of work called Beautiful Seven (Settebello). Both gather around a set of fifty found stones and hand drawings which cradle their forms. Colored fingers reflect Molteni’s childhood habit of counting Hail Marys on their hands, like decades of Rosary prayer beads. Sibilline Books of Cumae speak of Cibele, a large black meteorite stolen from Phrygia by Romans when they learned of the great mountain mother’s rock form. Biblical excerpts coax the human heart away from the earth and toward a purified “flesh”. Meanwhile, the animistic world, by which shells, lagoons, mountains, comets and stars are alive and pulsing, observes the heart of stone. When counting beads and beats, bodies reunite with the rhythms of heaven and earth. Through this lens Molteni exercises what they call Celestial Antiphony, a call-and-response relationship with the divine.