My artistic practice is centred on contemporary painting, moving between figurative works, still lifes and abstract compositions. I work primarily with acrylic, oil paint and mixed media on canvas, developing each painting through observation, intuition and experimentation. Rather than reproducing reality, I transform it into a personal visual language through colour, composition and the simplification of form.
People, everyday objects and plants all serve as starting points for my work. I am interested in how familiar subjects can be reinterpreted through painting and how they gain a new presence within the picture. By reducing detail and altering proportions, I create compositions that move beyond representation and invite multiple interpretations.
Since 2024, I have also been working with clay. I am fascinated by its tactile qualities and its ability to take on a wide variety of forms, offering new possibilities for exploring volume, texture and expression.
My paintings explore the relationship between form, colour and space. Whether working figuratively or abstractly, I approach each canvas as a place where visual elements interact and create their own internal logic. The image is not intended to illustrate reality but to become an independent visual experience. I see painting as an open process of observation, transformation and discovery, in which the final work develops its own atmosphere and meaning through the act of painting itself.
Biography
Short Biography – Maruta Müller
Maruta Müller was born in 1982 in Riga, Latvia, and moved to Hamburg after graduating from high school in 2000. She studied Art History and Ethnology at the University of Hamburg. She completed her studies with a Magistra Artium degree in Art History. Her thesis was titled “Frida Kahlo: La columna rota – Transformation of the Body.”
Professionally, she has worked in management, air freight logistics, and trademark law, and since 2024 she has been working in research support at the HafenCity University Hamburg, where she coordinates research projects and manages third-party funding.
Alongside her professional career, Maruta Müller is active as an artist. In 2009 she participated in the international online collaboration “Games 2” by Istvan Ocztos (Hungary), in which artists from 14 countries contributed to a collective digital publication. In 2010 she contributed digital works to the online exhibition “Next” by Valnilla.org, which explored experimental virtual spaces for international artistic collaboration.
Since 2023 she has focused increasingly on urban sketching, which has formed a basis for her painting practice. Since 2024 she has also been working with clay, expanding her artistic practice into sculpture. In 2024 she presented oil paintings and urban sketches in the exhibition Venus meets Mars in a curated private-space presentation. She currently assists in organizing the performance and film festival FUTUR X (10th edition).