The Metropolitan Museum of Art Acquires Works by Ares Maia, Communication Design ’20
For more than 100 years, zines have been used by artists, creatives, thinkers, and more as a way to communicate about ideas, issues, and other topical stories. Recently, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City acquired seven zines created by Ares Maia, Communication Design ‘20, which celebrate her experiences as an immigrant, and visual artist.
Maia’s zines are deeply personal, and often inspired by her mother and grandmother. One of the zines now in the Met’s collection is called “Lady Bugs,” which is a tribute to Maia’s grandmother’s warmth and love.
“My Zines are whimsical, yet very personal and comforting,” she says. “They allow me to explore both literal and symbolic interpretations of my identity and my immigration story. Dreams have always fascinated me too because they offer a space where logic doesn’t always apply, but when we pay attention deeper truths can surface through symbols and imagery. I find that much of my work bridges these two worlds—the tangible and the dreamlike, my personal stories coexist with the surreal in my zines.”
Maia’s process of creating a zine usually begins with an urgent thought, which then turns into sketching, writing, and interpreting symbols she encounters in her everyday life. Although she has a background in communication design, Maia finds significant satisfaction in physically crafting each zine by hand, where she uses a printer, staples, coils, stitching, gems, and incorporates paper of different textures, various inks, custom stamps, and more into her pieces.
“The imperfections in the process—like uneven cuts or stapled pages—give each piece its own life and charm,” she explains. “It’s an intimate form of art-making, where the manual effort becomes part of the narrative I’m telling on a sensory level. As a working artist, I’m well-versed in the slick, fast-paced world of corporate design where technology is constantly evolving. But despite that, there’s something fundamentally human about the need for touch—the feel of paper, the texture of ink, the visible signs of craftsmanship. My zines are entirely handmade, filled with small imperfections. Initially, this made me feel insecure, but over time, I came to understand that this was exactly what made my work stand out and resonate.”
Themes related to belonging, displacement, and the balance between preserving her roots while adapting to a new environment are at the core of Maia’s artistic practice. She aims to center memory through the lens of an immigrant experience in her work, and draws on her upbringing in Brazil to guide her process.
Maia considers her Parsons education to be transformative, a place where she was introduced to zines, riso printing, and more. She also completed eight different internships during her studies, gaining vital experience at leading companies including Saturday Night Live, Sony Music, Marvel, NBC News, and more.
“Being surrounded by such a diverse group of people exposed me to different cultures, artistic approaches, ways of thinking, which was so valuable. Parsons pushed me to embrace my own identity as an artist, and to see the value in my perspective.”
Since graduating from Parsons in 2020, Maia has been working full-time as a senior designer, while continuing to pursue her own artistic practice. She often works on projects before and after work, and feels privileged to be able to pursue art, while so many from her own community do not have the opportunity.
“I feel a strong responsibility to tell our stories and share perspectives that are often missing in the art world,” she shares. “As immigrants, many of us don’t have the luxury of making excuses, so to me, there are no excuses when it comes to doing what needs to be done. I apply that same mindset to my work—whether it’s my day job or my art, I push forward, even when it feels overwhelming.”
Next up, Maia is at work on expanding one of her projects that is related to her zine My Accent is the Only Thing I Have From Home, which was also acquired by The Met. She is also collaborating with two other immigrant artists on a project about their shared experiences related to their struggles and upbringings.