Maria Barnas

Maria Barnas (1973, Hoorn, The Netherlands) lives and works in Amsterdam. She is a Dutch artist, poet and writer, working at the intersection of image and language. In the context of the power dynamics underlying both, she researches the different modi operandi of translation, whether between different languages or between language and image, and its implications. Other topics of interest include the appropriation of language and the pursuit of new languages. Central to Barnas' approach is the human body and the physical experience of language. Working in the space of ambiguity, between what is and is not, she creates objects, video works, audio pieces and performances that attempt to grasp and contain our experience of reality.

Barnas studied at the Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam and was resident at the Rijksakademie, Amsterdam, with further residencies at the American Academy, Rome; Made in Mirrors, Recife; and Galerie du Jour, Paris (Agnès B). In 2015 she won the Elisabeth van Thuringen Project Prize. In 2008 she was awarded the Cees Buddingh' Prize for her first collection of poetry, and Jaja de oerknal (2013) received the Anna Bijn Prize in 2014.

Solo exhibitions include Song for Three Rooms, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo (2019); I Need to Have a Point, Kennedy van der Laan, Amsterdam (2018); We Are Turning Corners, Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2017); Sputter Fiction, Nationaal Glasmuseum, Leerdam (2016); The Planet O, Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2014); Then, Then, The Bakery, Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2012); Apple of My Eye, Bergen (2011); The Lost Park, MAMAM, Recife (2010); The Living Room, Klemm's Gallery, Berlin (2010); and The Lost Park, Schunck Glaspaleis, Heerlen (2009).

Group exhibitions include Sketches of Transition: An Atlas on Growth and Decay, Dutch Design Week, Onomatopee Projects, Eindhoven (2023); Smoothing (lines into circles), A Tale of a Tub, Rotterdam (2021); Beating around the Bush #6: Scenes from the Anthropocene, Bonnefantenmuseum (2020); Realisme, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam (2019); New Reproductions, Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2018); Unresolved, De Appel Arts Centre, Amsterdam (2016); When I Give, I Give Myself, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (2015); Beating around the Bush, Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht (2014); Seeing is Believing, Witte de With, Rotterdam (2013); and Opera Aperta, Dutch Pavilion, Venice Biennial (2009).

Works are held in the collections of the Bonnefantenmuseum, ABN AMRO, and AMC Art Collection.