Maria Yolanda Liebana: A Place to be Held
Essex
Montclair State University Galleries
A Place to Be Held is the first solo museum exhibition by NYC-based artist Maria Yolanda Liebana. Inspired by the birth of her daughter, Liebana explores motherhood as both a physical and spiritual terrain. Through her immersive installations and mixed-media works shaped by mythology, Tarot, Catholic imagery, art history, and popular culture, she creates a vibrant world of care, transformation, and belonging.
Maria Yolanda Liebana
A Call to Heretics, 2024
Mixed media, acrylic, mirror tiles, plastic decals, wallpaper, foam, foam clay, inkjet on paper, sequins, fabric paint, glitter, oyster shells, and plastic beads on wood panel
48 × 60 inches
Courtesy of Kravets Wehby Gallery
Photographer: Adam Reich
A Place to Be Held is the first solo museum exhibition by NYC-based artist Maria Yolanda Liebana. The exhibition imagines a matriarchal world where chance, identity, and desire are always in motion. Inspired by the birth of her daughter, Liebana explores motherhood as both a physical and spiritual terrain shaped by labor, wonder, and transformation.
Drawing from ancient mythologies, Catholic imagery, art history, Tarot, and contemporary popular culture, Liebana layers these influences into bold mixed-media works and site-specific installations. Her densely layered materials—including pearls, glitter, disco balls, mirror tiles, sequins, rhinestones, and wallpaper—bring together the sacred and the everyday, the serious and the playful. Gluttony becomes an aesthetic strategy. Identity is not singular but infinite. Liebana challenges societal norms, crafting her own mythologies that encompass trans beauty, strength, vulnerability, and agency.
The exhibition features selections from Liebana's Venus Crusades and Tarot Card series, alongside three new immersive environments: an Eden-inspired garden, a cosmic arcade, and a metaphysical sanctuary. Through these installations, Liebana suggests that community and belonging can be built across differences, highlighting the power of care, transformation, and the freedom to become who we are.