Born in Bogotá, Colombia, Olga de Amaral is an important figure in the development of post–World War II Latin American abstraction. Her deeply personal work reflects Colombian culture through an exploration of architecture, mathematics, landscape, and socio-cultural dichotomies. Since the mid-1970s, she has been transforming woven structures through painted layers of gesso and precious metals. For de Amaral, gold leaf and gesso have a transcendent value, linked to Colombia’s colonial and ecclesiastical heritage. As she explains, “When I experience anxiety, I begin to put things in order. Using the gesso—the whitewash, really—is like having a fresh start” (Talley 1990, 44).

De Amaral was also part of an international fiber art movement that took hold during the 1960s and 1970s, led predominantly by female artists who employed traditional weaving and non-loom techniques to create large-scale fiber sculptures and installations. In order to create her labor-intensive, large-scale works, she established an atelier in Bogotá. De Amaral explained in 2005, “For the last twenty-five years I have worked with seven lives, fourteen hands, seven women who infuse each small element with Colombia’s vitality.” She continued, “The communal process impregnates each bundle of strands with the spirit of each of these women’s lives, each element acquires a unique patina, as does the knob on the door to a frequented room” (de Amaral 2005). jkd