Mayra is a visual artist living and working in Houston, TX. Her work consists of mixed media sculpture, photography, video, installation, writing and drawing. She is interested in the physicality of emotion, not only how the body reacts to psychological thought but how physical objects convey these emotions as well. She received a BFA in sculpture from the University of Houston and is currently an artist in residence at Box 13. During this residency Mayra Huerta made works that explore mourning and our inability to comprehend or accept nothingness after death. Through the act of writing fiction that manifests physically, she explores how people use storytelling to cope with loss and mortality.

website / Instagram

“This piece is made with a goodbye letter I wrote a friend the night after I found out she had passed away.”

“For this piece I layered modeling paste and paint on glass panels, letting them dry overnight.”

Descent, 2018, Glass, modeling paste, paint, wood, 24”x 18”x 11”

"I wrote a short story about an after death scenario in which the main character experiences space in a tangible way much like we do, but where matter is not as solid as we know it. She could, for example, descend into rooms without using stairs.”

Descent, 2018, Glass, modeling paste, paint, wood, 24”x 18”x 11”

“The short stories I write to facilitate making objects, often find themselves in the final piece.”

Descent, 2018, Glass, modeling paste, paint, wood, 24”x 18”x 11”

“The short stories I write to facilitate making objects, often find themselves in the final piece.”

“The layers in this piece stacked on top of each other go from a violent texture to a light wash of color to give the sense of change in space and the feeling of sinking.”

"This is a collection of some of the materials I often use in my work. They consist of wax, nylon fabrics, oil, mylar, petroleum jelly, polyurethane foam and vellum. I am attracted to the illusion of softness and transparent quality in materials."

"The piece I created this week started with a rubbing of the walls in my studio. The marks of the the bumps on the wall captured by the charcoal remind me of the protrusions found inside old music boxes that become notes when struck."

Fog, 2018, Nylon, paper, charcoal, 80”x 25”x 3”

"For the second week of my residency I wrote a short story about an after death scenario in which the main character walks along an empty field of fog for an undetermined amount of time while a song from her childhood floats around her."

"It took several layers of fabric at different lengths and shades to achieve a diffusion of color that softly conceals the charcoal notes."

“This week I began by writing an after death scenario in which the character’s vision is obstructed.”

“To get a variety of washes on paper I diluted ink and paint at various values.”

Blur, 2018, Paper, ink, acrylic, graphite, foam, vellum, nylon, pins, 15”x 20”x 2”

"The dark marks in this piece disappear and reappear depending on how far or closely the piece is being viewed, but the outlines are always present. The viewer’s vision is unfocused much like the character in the story."