New Art Projects is delighted to present What does an atom look like, the first solo exhibition by Amy Poliero. Poliero is an American multimedia artist currently based in London who recently completed her MA in Fine Art at Chelsea College of Arts following a BA in Fine Art with a minor in Astrophysics at The George Washington University (2022).

Her fine art practice spans 2D, 3D, and occasionally 4D works, translating ideas from cosmology, chemistry, and physics into visual form. Elegant, pared down, and materially exact, her work explores the boundaries of human perception using speculative geometry. She invites viewers into a world devoid of time and scale by rendering organic shapes with the cool precision of a science journal. Her practice reflects on principles of uncertainty and interdependence, and she is inspired by how the physical limitations of atomic particles underpin our inability to predict the future.

The resulting works emerge in two distinct forms. Firstly: carefully constructed mixed media ‘paintings’ on canvas, rendered in soft, gentle colours, appear as organic or naturally occurring abstractions. The beguiling surfaces that she creates mask rigorous intellectual threads of enquiry that extend the visual appearance of the work. Secondly: large, welded metal sculptures also play with a geometric language but challenge our perception of scale and exist in the gallery in stark contrast to her picture making.

She observes that “in the age of automation and artificial intelligence, what differentiates the human condition?” Her response is “a visual testimony to the worldview emerging from quantum physics: our conscious, linear experience of time collapses the universe’s infinite potential for manifestation into reality.”