Piia Maria is a Finnish visual artist and designer who lives and works in the Netherlands. She started her studies at the University of Art and Design in Helsinki and graduated at The Royal Academy of Visual Arts in The Hague from the fashion and textile department.
Piia enjoys working as a designer for fashion companies, but her true passion is body in a broader sense. Soon after graduation she started making sculpture of bodies. She is fascinated by skin, and she closely connects theatre-specific and autonomous sculptures. Her work has been presented in several galleries, museums and open air exhibitions. In 2003 she won two art prices with her sculpture Drifting Space.
Piia Marias fascination for the relationship between body, costumes, movement and space lead her into theater design. The past 9 years she has made designs of sets and costumes for more than 20 theater or dance productions in different countries such as Switzerland, Germany and Bhutan.
At the moment Piia is focusing most on fashion design. In 2008-2009 she developed 2 collections for the Dutch label Alchemist. (www.alchemist.cc). In 2010 she started collaboration with Freelancefashiondesign.com. Her latest work is a knitwear collection for Vero Moda.
Piia is also interested in teaching. She teaches Industrial Design at The Technical University of Delft in the Netherlands. She loves giving workshops for children or mature groups in art and design.
