Marria Pratts Spanish, b. 1988

Marria Pratts is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice exudes an uninhibited, spontaneous spirit. Her artistic output includes a repertoire of decidedly varied formats. Drawing, painting, sculpture, carpets, furniture and fanzines combine playful energy with a bright and optimistic colour palette. Within the apparent cacophony of her paintings, a series of recurring motifs—clocks, faces, hands, ladders and the ubiquitous ghosts—emerge as representatives of encounters from her meanderings through the city. Entering her L’Hospitalet home and studio is like stepping into one of her paintings. She takes inspiration from her immediate surroundings: the streets, the people who inhabit them and her close circle of friends and regular collaborators, including photographers, designers and musicians. Her work can be read as a defiance of our social structures, the contradictions that permeate the urban landscape and the challenges of living in places under the constant threat of gentrification.

Marria Pratts studied graphic design at the Escola Massana, Barcelona, but is largely self-taught. She has had solo shows at Everyday Gallery, Brussels (2021), and SADE Gallery, Los Angeles (2019), and group shows at Tecla Sala, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (2021), and Costa Mesa Conceptual Art Center, Los Angeles (2020). Her work also featured in Punk: Its Traces in Contemporary Art, which took place at the Centro de Arte 2 de Mayo, Madrid; MACBA Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona; and Artium, Vitoria (2015–2016).