Ario Elami

A Hudson-based artist, and graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts’ graduate program through Tufts University. I am a composer and author besides. I claim dual citizenship as both an Iranian and North American, and have spent my life growing among the east coast and midwest.

My latest artwork mainly explores architecture as visceral and botanical analogy, and the tension between human design emerging from the ground of being versus nature being on the verge of reclaiming its birthright. It has developed in tandem with an understanding of the earliest architecture as numinous altars, upon which were laid sacrificial items such as teeth, eggs, skulls, and vertebrae; and a perception of nature as a roiling mass of aggressive life, perpetuating itself through overabundance.

In this sense, architecture manifested out of spiritual violence, and was a site for what is inner to become externalized. My work can thus be read meta-textually: it depicts sites of sacrifice, and is itself an act of sacrifice, driven by mysterious passions. Through contexts such as these, one can review the body itself as a bound up architecture -- erotic, excretory, and orificial --, with all of our concomitant desires and fears placed upon it. Outside of this, I’m drawn to architecture for the possibilities it offers for formal games, and the particular visual obsessions it can give rise to.

My writing has been published on sites and in digital publications such as No Escape Magazine (1), DEEP HELL (1) Kotaku (1) Heterotopias (1), Kill Screen (1, 2), Unwinnable (1, 2), Game Music Online (1, 2, 3), and Boston Hassle (1, 2). My first album, Vurgon, was released on the Ubiktune label in 2013, and my second, MAGNO, was released in 2021. In recent years, I’ve done contractual work as a concept artist for several projects.


EXHIBITIONS

  • Homes, Hamlets & Villages: Style and Lifestyle in Small Towns and Rural Communities || Spencertown Academy, Spencertown NY; 2023

  • MICE 2022 || Fuller Building, Boston MA; 2022

  • Storylines || Gallery 263, Cambridge MA; 2021

  • MICE 2020 || Lesley University Hall, Cambridge MA; 2020

  • Untitled exhibit || CultureHouse, Boston MA; 2020

  • SMFA & BPS 2016 Zine Exhibition || SMFA, Boston MA; 2016

  • Art of the Book || Dana Art Gallery, Wellesley, MA; 2014

  • Baker’s Dozen || Gallery Ehva, Provincetown MA; 2013

  • Thesis exhibition || Aidekman Arts Center, Medford, MA; 2013

  • WIT || Mission Hill Gallery, Boston MA; 2012

  • Proof of Purchase || Samsøn Projects, Boston MA; 2012

  • Print & Paper || SMFA, Boston MA; 2012

  • The Art of the Book || William Morris Hunt Memorial Library, Boston MA; 2012

  • Drawing Area Show || SMFA, Boston MA; 2012

  • Prints & Drawings || Works on Paper Lubeznik Center for the Arts, Michigan City IN; 2009

  • Grafted || DePree Art Center and Gallery, Holland MI; 2009

  • NYCAMS Student Show || Fall 2008 NYCAMS Gallery, NYC, NY; 2008

  • Annual Juried Student Show || DePree Art Center and Gallery, Holland MI; 2007


PUBLICATIONS

  • The Soul of Place: My Favorite Dark Souls Sites || No Escape (2022)

  • Ruins of Memory || Deep Hell (2020)

  • Souls Games are Great, Except for the Messages from Some Players || Kotaku (2018)

  • Secret Geometries || Heterotopias, Issue 2 (2017)

  • My Inner Scales || Unwinnable (2016)

  • Where Did the Fun Street Fighter Music Go? || Kill Screen (2016)

  • A Conversation on Boston's "Heroic" Architecture || Boston Hassle (2016)

  • How Dark Souls' Concept Art Might Have Deep Ties to Its Environmental Design || Gamasutra (2016)

  • Understanding the Sublime Architecture of Bloodborne || Kill Screen (2015)

  • Masashi Hamauzu Piano Works δ・ε・T_Comp 1 || Video Game Music Online (2014)