Hand-Dyed Tapestry Painting by French Artist, Marie-Laure Ilie, 1990s

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There is something so captivating about this dreamy composition called "Moonride" that makes us feel like we're floating through the … Read more There is something so captivating about this dreamy composition called "Moonride" that makes us feel like we're floating through the midnight desert sky with the moon illuminating the path to enlightenment. This feels less like a literal depiction and more like a state of being. Though the title suggests a reference to the celestial body, in art just as in this piece, it is rarely about the object itself, but rather it's a metaphor for phases & transformation, passage of time, mystery and introspection.

Conceptually, the artwork is composed of a large solid lower field (blue & grey gradating to white) that represents the dream state (or current state of being) and the band of loose, translucent orange-tinted strips at the top could represent a new dawn, a threshold or new state of mind yet to be resolved. The symbolic moon (us or the artist) is in that liminal zone between who we were and who we are becoming. This piece may be a reference to or the result of a specific and pivotal moment in the artist's practice when, during the 1980s and early 1990s, she was producing large-scale vivid color abstract compositions on silk, with multiple layers of silk and translucent fabric, she then turned toward classical figuration.

Signed by Artist on bottom right corner.

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Marie-Laure Ilie (b. 1945) is a native of Paris, a former Fulbright Grant recipient and an MA graduate of The Sorbonne. Upon moving to the United States in the 1970s, she acquired formal art studies at the University of Michigan where she held a Teaching Fellowship and acquired an FBA. Her post graduate work includes painting, engraving and silk painting in Paris at Atelier de la Grand Chaumiere, Atelier Luçio Loubet, Atelier Friedlander, and Atelier Liza Bain where her extensive training complemented her personal art research.

She has shown her art extensively in the United States and Europe, in both solo exhibits and juried group shows, in galleries, universities, and museums. In addition to many private collections, corporate collections include the Bank of America, the Bank of New Zealand, Neiman-Marcus, Marshall Field and Company, Gale Research Company, and the Nicolaysen Art Museum. See less