A sculpture of rods tied with thin wire into an open shape. Its long shadow falls on a pale blue wall.

OXUS The artist

Maryam NajvanWire, paper, ink. Then gold.

Maryam is an artist. Her work has been shown in a gallery. She works with wire, paper, ink and charcoal. Every OXUS piece comes from the same hands and the same drawings.

Born in Isfahan. In Los Angeles since 2017.

She studied graphic design in Isfahan and industrial design at Azad University in Tehran. She taught herself to make jewelry.

Since 2021 she has worked as an independent artist. She makes sculptures you can wear. Her ideas come from nature, from movement and from Persian culture. She finds each idea first by drawing, and by working with the material.

A small sculpture of folded and curled metal, in a single beam of light, with a long shadow. — Folded metal, light and shadow

Shows and galleries

An artist first.

2025: Duets, Gallery 825; Her work was shown.
The River: Presented through MB Abram; A series of signed, one-of-a-kind wearable sculptures.
Member: Los Angeles Art Association
Since 2021: Independent artist; Sculpture, folded paper, ink, charcoal, photography and wearable sculpture.

I Room one

Wire on stone.

She wraps wire by hand around white stone. She crosses rods, ties them, and pulls thread tight. The wire holds the stone, the same way a ring setting holds a gem.

Shiny rods crossed and tied with orange thread and thin wire, on a smooth white stone. — Rods, thread and wire on white stone

A black and white photo: wire tied into crossed frames around a pale pointed stone, on a dark background. — Wire on stone, in black and white

Gold wire bent into an open ring with many sides, next to a round white stone. — An open ring of gold wire

Gold wire wrapped into a loose cube, with a smooth white stone inside. — A cage of gold wire

Gold-colored rods tied with pink and purple thread into a spiky open shape, on a white stone. — Rods with pink and purple thread

II Room two

Folded paper.

She folds paper until it stands on its own and makes a shadow. Many small folds, flat sides, or one fold from corner to corner. The shapes in her gold jewelry start here.

White paper, folded

Folded paper, red ink

Paper flowers on wire

A black and white photo: a square sheet of paper folded corner to corner, both ways. Its four points lift and make shadows. — One sheet, two folds

Two small squares of painted paper in orange, red and dark blue, each folded in the center, side by side on white paper. — Two painted squares, folded

III Room three

Ink and charcoal.

Ink put down in one movement. A circle drawn in one stroke. Charcoal moved across the page until a figure appears. Every piece of jewelry starts the same way: as a drawing on her desk.

A white circle in the center of thick, shiny black ink, with spots of red, on thin paper. — The circle, ink on paper

Blue ink on paper

Red ink in a square

Charcoal figure

Portrait in charcoal

A large face in black ink over a hand-drawn grid, with small squares of paper folded up from the page. — A face on a grid, ink and folded paper

A palm tree painted in loose black lines over soft yellow, green, blue and pink, signed at the bottom right.

IV Room four

Beneath California palms, the Oxus still flows.

From Isfahan to Los Angeles. The palm tree comes back again and again in her work, in paint and in metal. In her own words: inspired by palm trees and nature, handcrafted in Los Angeles.

Palm, watercolor

Wearable sculpture

The River

A series of signed, one-of-a-kind sculptures you can wear. She makes them the same way she makes her art. Presented through MB Abram.

Signed One of one MB Abram

V How the art becomes the jewelry

From art to gold.

Put her art next to her jewelry, and you see the same shapes: a fold, a cage, a circle, wrapped wire. She draws each piece and builds it in CAD, down to the last stone. Then she directs expert casters and setters in the Jewelry District, and checks every step.

In paper

In gold

The fold

Heart pendant

14k gold Sapphire

First, paper folded corner to corner. Then the same shape in 14k gold, around a sapphire.
In wire and stone

In gold

The cage

Paloma pendant

18k gold Emerald

In her sculpture, wire holds a stone. In the pendant, an open gold hexagon holds a square emerald.
In paper

In gold

The pair

Paloma earrings

Solid gold Emeralds

Two squares folded at the corners. Then two square emeralds, each held in gold folded into a star.
In ink

In metal

The circle

Spiked bangle

Bangle

First, a circle drawn in one stroke. Then a circle for the wrist, with spikes shaped like brush lines.
On stone

Worn

The wrap

Wrapped wire necklace

Gold Green stones

The same crossed lines and wrapped wire, now made to wear.