During NYCxDesign week, the lighting and furniture design studio MATERIA will present its inaugural exhibition in the MATERI(A)RT series, an initiative that utilizes the company’s SoHo, New York gallery to showcase and potentiate the work of an evolving roster of as-yet unrepresented artists and craftspeople.

TRACES, by mixed media artist Malkia Williams, explores the intersection between an elemental and varied materials palette and the human body's many structures.

Williams, (b.2001) is an emerging Chicago-based artist who primarily focuses on sculpture as a medium, utilizing materials such as metal, wood and wool to render her detailed and imaginative somatic forms. Metalsmithing and casting both play large roles in her practice; iron and aluminum pours render molded, larger-scale forms, while silver and brass wire and sheets are utilized to create intricate, smaller-scale sculptures. Drawing direct inspiration from the structures of human anatomy and its abstracted nature, Williams isolates specific parts of the body to examine and reimagine.