Max Mara has marked a new chapter for the Max Mara Art Prize for Women by celebrating Indonesian multimedia artist Dian Suci as the winner of its tenth edition, announced at an evening event in Venice that also unveiled the prize’s new nomadic, international format.
Dian Suci Wins The 10th Max Mara Art Prize For Women
Dian Suci, a Yogyakarta based artist whose practice spans drawing, textiles, installation and performance, has been named the winner of the 2025–2027 edition of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women. It is the first time an Indonesian artist has received the accolade since the prize was established in 2005, underscoring Max Mara’s decision to shift its focus toward new geographies and voices in contemporary art.
Her winning proposal, “Crafting Spirit: Cultural Dialogues Beyond Domesticity,” draws on her lived experience as a single mother and explores how domestic labour, craft and spirituality intersect with the political domestication of women in Indonesia. The project will be developed during a bespoke six month residency in Italy and later shown in solo exhibitions in Jakarta and Reggio Emilia.
A Nomadic New Phase For The Prize
To coincide with the prize’s 20th anniversary, Max Mara, Collezione Maramotti and curator Cecilia Alemani have reimagined the award as a travelling, nomadic platform. Previously anchored in the UK in partnership with Whitechapel Gallery, the prize will now move to a new host country with each edition, with the tenth focused on Indonesia.
For this cycle, Alemani Director and Chief Curator of High Line Art in New York and curator of the 59th Venice Biennale chaired the jury that selected five Indonesian finalists before awarding the prize to Dian Suci. Future editions will similarly centre a different art scene and institutional partner, expanding the prize’s reach beyond Europe while keeping its core mission focused on women and female identifying artists.
Museum MACAN As Institutional Partner
In this first nomadic chapter, Museum MACAN Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Nusantara, Jakarta serves as institutional partner. The museum hosted the shortlist presentations and will present the resulting project in a solo exhibition following Dian Suci’s residency, with a second exhibition to follow at Collezione Maramotti in Reggio Emilia.
The collaboration marks the prize’s first ever presentation in Southeast Asia, and signals how Max Mara increasingly sees the prize as a bridge between Italian heritage and global contemporary art ecosystems.
What The Prize Offers The Winner
As with previous editions, the Max Mara Art Prize for Women gives its winner time, space and support at a pivotal career stage. Dian Suci will undertake a six month, tailor made residency in Italy, organised by Collezione Maramotti, moving between different Italian cities and contexts that relate to her project from craft ateliers and archives to communities and landscapes that resonate with her themes.
The residency is structured to allow research, experimentation and production of a new body of work, which will then be unveiled in two solo exhibitions and enter the Collezione Maramotti collection, providing both visibility and a lasting institutional home for the project.
Continuing A 20 Year Commitment To Women Artists
Conceived by Max Mara and Collezione Maramotti in 2005, the Max Mara Art Prize for Women was created to support emerging and mid career artists who identify as women at a key moment in their development. Over the past two decades, it has backed artists including Corin Sworn, Laure Prouvost, Hannah Rickards, Emma Hart and Helen Cammock, providing them with residencies in Italy and major museum exposures.
With its tenth edition, the prize reaffirms that commitment while widening its scope: by moving to Indonesia for this cycle and partnering with Museum MACAN, it highlights a vibrant Southeast Asian scene and centres an artist whose work addresses domesticity, gender and cultural dialogue from a non Western perspective.
In Venice, the celebration of Dian Suci’s win hosted against the backdrop of the city’s own art history symbolically linked Italian fashion, global contemporary art and a new, more international phase for one of the sector’s most respected women focused prizes.
