Maria Rubinke

b. 1985

Fragile Porcelain and Scenes of Horror

The artist Maria Rubinke unveils a surprising universe, where the white, fragile porcelain is juxtaposed with terrifying scenarios. She makes the purity and innocence disappear by equipping porcelain angels with skulls instead of cute, chubby faces and by letting birds pick the brains of little porcelain girls.

Rubinke was educated through the Glass and Ceramics programme at the School of Design on Bornholm, and since then her career has only gained in prominence with exhibitions around Denmark – and internationally in Norway, England and the United States as well as the home of porcelain, China.

Rubinke has been fascinated by porcelain from an early age, where she studied her grandmother's figures from The Royal Porcelain Factory. When considering the significance of her fierce tableaux, she has stated that they are based on the complexity of the human mind: “What I am making is self-portraits. I call it ‘state of mind’ art (…) I go to the places where the problems are. If it was all fine and dandy, then it wouldn’t matter”.