INFO
| Name | brunelle dias (she/her) |
| Born | 1998 |
| Country of Birth | India |
| Place of Residence | Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland |
| Ethnicities | Indian |
| Artform | Visual arts |
| Decades Active | 2020s |
ABOUT
brunelle dias is a Mumbai-born artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau whose practice reflects intimate personal and family moments. The content of her paintings ranges from people close to her to drying tea towels to bunches of bananas, offering a glimpse into memory and her everyday.
Born in 1998, dias migrated to Aotearoa at the age of ten with her family. She describes herself as a ‘drawer who likes to paint’. The figures in her large-scale unstretched canvas paintings are obscured, many faces are blurred or hidden, and some even have their faces pointed away and hidden from the viewer’s eye. dias plays with traditions of landscape painting and balances composition and light, instead of focusing primarily on the details of her subjects. She blends setting, gesture, and content — often having the boundaries merge and seep into each other, making the canvas an impartial ground. Her broad brushstrokes, visible paint drips and blending of colours mimic the way she explores the potential of canvas and paint to transform bodies and memories into partially disintegrated and representational versions of reality.
In 2021 dias completed her Master's of Visual Arts at AUT and has exhibited across Aotearoa, including a solo exhibition at The Physics Room in 2022, curated by Amy Weng.
LINKS
Key works / presentations
2023 — Kiss Taraf, The Art Paper Offices, Tāmaki Makaurau
2023 — Auckland Arts Festival 2023: The Realists, Depot Artspace, Tāmaki Makaurau
2023 — playing the fool, Bruce, Tāmaki Makaurau
2023 — a soft protest, play_station Artist-run Space, Pōneke,
2022 — local migrant, RM Gallery, Tāmaki Makaurau
2022 — the way things are, The Physics Room, Ōtautahi
Key awards
2023 — Molly Morpeth Canaday Award: Craigs Investments Partners Youth Award
2019 — Lakehouse Takapuna Art Centre: EMERGENT: SEE Award
