Maria Stabio

Maria Stabio’s work stems from a fascination with the beautifully mundane. From an early age, she painted and drew anything from her pet bird to a friend’s portrait. Not until high school did she enroll in formal art classes, the catalyst for her heightened perception. Unsure of the kind of art she would practice, Maria enrolled in Boston University’s College of Fine Arts program. After the required two years of core training, she decided to major in Painting. She also nursed a strong interest in photography, taking any class available and working in jobs related to the field, learning design skills along the way. During her junior year, she traveled to Venice, Italy for a semester and gained a profound appreciation for Renaissance art. During her final year, she began to unify interests, using photographs she had taken as a reference for her paintings. The first inspirational setting came from a short period of house sitting for photographer Alex MacLean in Lincoln, MA. Upon returning, she used these images to compose her first four paintings of this collection. Today, she continues to experiment with this method, using her camera like a sketchbook of sorts. Currently, she rents a small studio space in San Francisco, her hometown, and works at a commercial photography studio as a digital artist. Her local achievements include the group show Art Soup 16 as well as a group showing at Aspect Gallery in San Francisco. Online, she has been featured at Glassbottled.com (now defunct) and Upstream People Gallery. Publications include Redivider Journal in Boston, MA and Photographer’s Forum Best of College Photography 2007 in Santa Barbara, CA.