Maria Madeira is one of Timor-Leste's most significant contemporary visual artists with an internationally regarded practice deeply embedded in Timor-Leste traditions, concerns and histories. She is based in Timor-Leste's capital, Dili and Perth, Australia, where she migrated with her family in 1983 following seven years in a refugee camp in Portugal. A prominent figure in Timor-Leste's recovery since it achieved independence twenty-five years ago, Madeira has recently been artist-in-residence at Dili's Fundação Oriente.
Read MoreMadeira was born in the village of Gleno in the Ermera region of Timor-Leste. The Indonesian régime invaded in 1975, and her family was evacuated to Portugal the following year. She spent most of the following seven years in a refugee camp run by the Red Cross on the outskirts of Lisbon and migrated with her family to Australia in 1983.
Over the years, she obtained several academic qualifications. She graduated with a B.A. Fine Arts (Visual Arts) Degree from Curtin University, Perth in 1991. Two years later she received a Graduate Diploma of Education (Major in Art) from the same university. In 1996, she obtained her second degree, a B.A. in Political Science from Murdoch University. In 2019, she completed a Doctor of Philosophy in Art from Curtin University.
Between 1996 and 2000, she worked in Western Australia as a high school art teacher, visual artist and cultural advisor for several arts and cultural organisations. Between 2000 – 2004, she returned to Timor-Leste to contribute to the recovery, rebuilding and redevelopment of Timor-Leste, the newest nation in Asia.
Selected solo exhibitions include Flowery Talk, Fundação Oriente, Dili, Timor-Leste, 2023 – 24; Mana Maria, Chiang Mai University, Thailand 2022; A Place in the Sun, Fundação Oriente, Dili, Timor-Leste, 2022; Timor-Leste: An Artistic Perspective, University of Colorado, 2019; Ina Lou (Dear Mother Earth), Galeri Cipta II, Jakarta, 2014; Familiar Steps, Festival da Lusofonia, Macau, 2011 and Silent Voices, Cannery Arts Centre, Esperance, Western Australia, 2007.
Selected group exhibitions include Biennale Jogja XVI Equator #6, Yogyakarta National Museum, Indonesia, 2021; ARTFEM: Women artists 2_nd International Biennial of Macau_, Natura Albergue SCM, Macau, 2020; Elastic (Borracha) Mobile Residency, Chan Contemporary Art Space, Northern Centre for Contemporary Art and Cross Art Projects, Darwin Australia, 2014; Arte Lusofona Contemporanea, Galeria Marta Traba, São Paulo, Brazil, 2011 and Picturing the Sea, Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, University of Western Australia, 2006
Text courtesy Anna Schwartz Gallery.
