Ave Maria

54 cm x 54 cm framed

Digitally printed on ChromaLuxe

It began not as music, but as flight.

In Walter Scott's The Lady of the Lake, Ellen Douglas is pursued through the Scottish Highlands. She rows across a mist-covered loch in search of sanctuary, and in her small boat, she sings — a prayer to the Virgin Mary, for refuge, for grace.

In 1825, Franz Schubert set that prayer to music, scoring it for piano and violin — the violin carrying the soprano's voice, the words themselves. This piece reimagines that music as colour. Every note has been given its own hue, radiating outward from a single centre. The longer rays reaching toward the edge are the piano; the shorter rays held closer to the centre are the violin — Ellen's voice, still pleading, still afloat. Together they form a luminous rhythm of devotion: a compass of colour pointing toward sanctuary.

It is Elizabeth Mikellides' first circular work, and the longest composition she has translated to date — the circular form inviting the same slow contemplation as the prayer it holds.

Printed on high-definition ChromaLuxe with a soft matte-gloss finish, built to hold its depth and quiet for years.

First shown at the Art Biennale Sur Mer with São Rafael Galleries — a single night aboard a private yacht on Manhattan's East River, September 13th, 2025.