Indonesian Artist Dian Suci Wins Max Mara Art Prize for Women

Dian Suci b. 1985, Indonesia Follow +

Yogyakarta-based artist Dian Suci has been announced today as the winner of the 10th edition of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women. Suci—who was singled out from a shortlist including four other artists, Betty Adii, Dzikra Afifah, Ipeh Nur and Mira Rizki—was chosen by a jury appointed and chaired by Cecilia Alemani, made up of Venus Lau, director of Museum Macan in Jakarta, curator Amanda Ariawan, gallerist Megan Arlin, collector Evelyn Halim and artist Melati Suryodarmo. 

Suci’s project proposal, Crafting Spirit: Cultural Dialogues in Heritage and Practice, will investigate how the millennia-old tradition of religious craftsmanship has changed under capitalism, through a comparative study of Italy and Indonesia. This new body of work sets out to retrace the embodiment of faith, care and ritual in physical gestures and manual labour.

For the past 20 years, Max Mara and Collezione Maramotti (the private collection of Max Mara founder Achille Maramotti) have worked in close collaboration with Whitechapel Gallery to identify and support emerging women artists from the UK, through a six-month tailor-made residency in Italy, and a solo show at the gallery and Collezione Maramotti. After two decades based in London, the prize will now collaborate with international partners, starting with the Macan Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Nusantara, Jakarta.

This residency will see Suci travel through four different Italian cities, where she will explore the commercialisation of faith and the history of craftsmanship, seen as a living archive that testifies to the traditions and memory of a nation. Visiting Assisi, Rome, Lecce and Florence, Suci will follow a research path that encompasses the the commodification of the creed, the symbolism of the Roman Catholic Mass liturgy, the history of papier-mâché, the use of egg tempera and ancient handweaving techniques through the centuries and their place in religious art-making.

The resulting show will open at Macan in summer 2027, and the show at the Collezione Maramotti will open in October that year.

Suci has previously used her work to address issues connected to the political domestication of women, authoritarianism and fascism, and the patriarchy and capitalism, drawing from everyday experience as a single mother. Now, she will bring this perspective to Italy, exploring how global profit and market forces reshape the materialization of faith through craft. —[O]

Main image: Dian Suci, Larung May the Blooms Be Carried Safely through the Night (2024). Wood carved palanquin, wood carved pieces, mordant on cotton and silk fabric dyed with betel nut and sappan wood, lamp, oil on canvas, wooden buffalo head, Jepara handwoven fabric, prayer beads, three-colored incense resin, spice-based dye extract on cotton fabric. Variable dimensions. © and ph. Dian Suci