On Friday 24 May 2024 at 17.30, at the Bottega Cini premises, Dorsoduro 862 Venice, Maria Madeira, one of the most significant contemporary visual artists on the international scene, talks with Cristina Baldacci, Università Ca’ Foscari in Venice. During the meeting, the full video of the performance “Kiss and Don’t Tell” is screened, in which Maria Madeira pays tribute to the women of East Timor, victims of violence and abuse during the years of Indonesian occupation. The video remains available to the public in the Bottega Cini multimedia room until 31 May.
An event promoted and organised by the publishing house Skira in collaboration with Bottega Cini by The Merchant of Venice and the Fondazione Archivio Vittorio Cini.

Maria Madeira was born in the village of Gleno, in the Ermera region of East Timor. She was forced to leave Timor in 1976 during the Indonesian invasion. She spent most of the following eight years in a refugee camp run by the Red Cross on the outskirts of Lisbon, Portugal. She emigrated with her family to Australia in August 1983.
She graduated with a B.A. in Fine Arts (Visual Arts) from Curtin University in 1991. Two years later she obtained a Graduate Diploma in Education (Major in Art) from the same university. In 1996 she earned a second degree, a B.A. in Political Science from Murdoch University. In 2019, she became a Doctor of Philosophy – Art at Curtin University in Australia.
Between 1996 and 2000, she worked in Western Australia as a high-school art teacher, visual artist and cultural consultant. Between 2000 and 2004, she returned to East Timor to fulfil her role in the recovery, reconstruction and development of her country and of Asia’s newest nation. She currently lives in Perth with her partner and son.
Maria works with a wide range of media, from painting to sculpture, drawing, mixed-media collage and installation. Her work has been exhibited in more than 30 international exhibitions in Australia, Portugal, Brazil, Macao, Indonesia and East Timor.
She firmly believes that art and culture are the spirit and soul of a nation and are a vehicle through which future generations can learn to appreciate the beauty and strength of their own culture and, in this way, discover their place in the world.

For further information

• Maria Madeira