Review: Maze of Whispers by Mari Zand

Mesmerising

Mari Zand, aka MadMaraca is an artist from Iran currently based in Istanbul, Turkey. She's known for creating intricate worlds using voxels, a 3D version of pixels, and her work is breathtaking.

When she contacted me to ask if I'm interested to feature her artbook, I looked at some preview pictures and agree immediately. When the book had arrived, it was way better than I expected.

This is a large cloth-bound hardcover artbook published by Tune & Fairweather and released in December 2024. Price of the book is USD 101 and shipping is calculated separately. At the time of review, the book is not available on Amazon.

The cover has this holographic print that shows three stages of creation of "The Soul Temple", an artwork in the book. The binding looks good. The paper used is high quality thick low-gloss 150gsm Gardapat Kiara. All the artworks are reproduced huge and beautifully.

This artbook features environmental art, and each world like a digital diorama. Themes are cities, gardens, temples, galaxies and visions.

I've seen voxel art before but I've never paid much attention. When I saw the first few artworks in this book, I thought it was just pixel art and when I looked close enough to see that everything was created with these tiny 3D blocks, voxels, I was mesmerised. While there are some closeups, I wished there were more closeups and renders from different angles.

Since MadMaraca is based in Istanbul, you can clearly see the architecture influence with the worlds she has created. There's this richness in the details that really makes think about the story behind the architecture. It's like what goes on in your mind when you're a tourist and you get to visit places or buildings of significance. I get this sense of awe with all the scenes shown. I've never seen textures created with 3D pixels that are so detailed.

I wonder how much it took to create all the worlds. We're not talking about just building but also colouring. The designs are amazing. Each scene looks and feels so different. And each scene looks so good I wish I can be on the "ground" to appreciate what I'm really looking at.

This is an amazing artbook, and this is easily one of the best artbooks from 2024. This is one of those artbooks that will be even more expensive when it's out of print.

This book is available for sale from the publisher's website.