Indonesian multimedia artist Dian Suci has been named the winner of the 10th edition of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women. The news was announced by the prize’s curator and jury chair, Cecilia Alemani and others today in Venice at a celebration held at the Serra dei Giardini. Suci was selected from a shortlist of five finalists that included Betty Adii, Dzikra Afifah, Ipeh Nur, and Mira Rizki. She was chosen by a jury organized and chaired by Alemani and made up of Museum MACAN director, Venus Lau; Jakarta-based curator, Amanda Ariawan; gallerist Megan Arlin of Sullivan+Strumpf, Indonesian performance artist Melati Suryodarmo, and collector Evelyn Halim.
The award, which honors emerging and mid-career female artists at an inflection point in their careers, will provide Suci with a six-month traveling residency in Italy to embark on an ambitious new project. The resulting piece will be presented in a solo show at Museum MACAN in Jakarta in summer 2027, before being presented again that fall at the Collezione Maramotti in Italy, which will acquire the work.
Yogyakarta-based Suci works across painting, sculpture, installation, and video. Drawing upon her experience as a single mother, she makes art that addresses the oppressive forces of patriarchy, capitalism, authoritarianism, and fascism that women face. The project for which she was selected, Crafting Spirit: Cultural Dialogues in Heritage and Practice, examines the tension between commerce and spirituality inherent in mass-produced devotional objects, comparing practices across Italy and Indonesia. Her research will take her to Assisi in Umbria to study the lifestyle of monks; to Rome, for a special Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica; to a papier-mâché training program in Lecce, Puglia; and finally to Florence, Tuscany, to learn the art of egg tempera and ancient hand-weaving.
“I am deeply honored to be selected as the recipient of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women. My proposal, Crafting Spirit: Cultural Dialogues in Heritage and Practice, emerges from stories of the body and memory within the lives and gestures of women artisans, whose work often exists between devotion and survival,” said the artist in a press statement. “I receive this opportunity with gratitude and a commitment to listen, to learn, and to translate these encounters into forms that honor the intimacy of human labor and the depth of cultural continuity.”
This is the 10th cycle of the prize, which will run through 2027. With this edition, the event has transitioned to a traveling event, whereas previous editions were organized in collaboration with Whitechapel Gallery in London and centered on U.K.-based women artists. Previous prize winners include Dominique White, Emma Talbot, and Helen Cammock.
