Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1967 London, England

Other name/s: Maria Ajike Amidu

Biography

Multimedia artist Maria Amidu was born in London to Nigerian parents from Lagos in 1967. Following her mother’s sudden death in 1973, Amidu and her two siblings were placed in a Catholic children's home in Bexhill-on-Sea, Sussex. Reflecting on her childhood, she recalled ‘So, you are black, you are growing up in a predominately white town, and it is 1973. In your own, quiet way you are clear about what you want in life, you cannot put your finger on it but you know it is not what you see around you in Bexhill. Life trickles on, you go to school, and you struggle with who you are and who other people say you are’ (Kerman p. 141). From 1980–86, Amidu and her younger sister lived in foster homes in Wigan, Lancashire. Amidu completed her foundation studies at St. Helens College of Art and Design, Merseyside, from 1985–86, where she developed a fascination with three-dimensional artwork and discovered her innate talent for working with clay. Subsequently, she received her BA in 3D design from West Surrey College of Art and Design (now University for the Creative Arts), Farnham (1986–89). The department's cultural perspective was primarily limited to a traditional European viewpoint and this absence of diversity may have contributed to frequent comparisons between Amidu's work and that of Kenyan-born potter, Magdalene Odundo, who had studied ceramics at the same college a decade earlier. Amidu felt frustrated by the instructors' narrow-minded assumption that their artistic practices were inherently alike, simply because they were both of African descent, later explaining in an interview that ‘The ‘she is black and you are black’ connection got really boring!’ (Kerman p. 146). In 1990 Amidu’s work was shown in Diverse Cultures, a group exhibition at London’s Crafts Council featuring 29 artists of African, Afro-Caribbean, and Middle and Far Eastern descent living in Britain. She subsequently gained her MA in glass and ceramics at the Royal College of Art, London (RCA), receiving an Eduardo Paolozzi Travel Bursary enabling her to visit Nigeria for the first time in 1991. On her return to the RCA, she felt the need more urgently to investigate diverse art traditions, particularly African and Black British. Her dissertation, titled Art or Ethnography, detailed her research into contemporary visual arts practice in Nigeria.

Merging visual arts, writing, and community involvement, Amidu's practice delves into the intricate social dynamics among individuals as shaped by objects and locations, using language, dialogue and memory to explore these themes. She has declared that ‘Through a social practice I aim to create space for meaningful connections between people. The resulting art works, often print or installation, are motivated by my aspiration to substantiate collective moments, experiences or situations’ (Amidu 2013). Drawing upon childhood experiences, Amidu’s mixed media installation …a moment caught in three dimension(s) (1999) was inspired by a piece of writing that she composed in 1998. Amidu selected five excerpts from her writing and replaced various nouns with cast glass objects, producing enlarged digital prints of the text and displaying the objects in wall-mounted acrylic cases. These items – a small book, cotton reel, house, and apple – served as powerful memory triggers, evoking her childhood experiences and fantasies. The installation was finalised during exCHANGES, a three-month residency at London's 198 Gallery, during which Amidu worked with Rea, an indigenous Australian digital artist. In 2015 Amidu was commissioned by Parliament to create two banners, 1807 Abolition of the Slave Trade and 1628 Petition of Right, to celebrate 800 years of the Magna Carta, a key moment in Britain's journey to a modern democracy; these are held by Westminster City Council and Brunel University London, respectively.

As a socially-involved artist, a significant portion of her creations are born out of collaboration, with extensive involvement from schools and various institutions. For Amidu, the process holds equal importance to the final artwork, and her cooperative method encompasses dialogue, discoveries, and shifts in trajectory. She has developed varied projects, including Where are we? (2020), Mid Sussex County Council; somewhere (2020), SEAS & Brighton Festival, and Watermarks (2021), a permanent commission of eight artworks for the Thames Estuary Trail as part of Estuary Festival 2021.

Recent exhibitions include Untitled: an Exhibition of Works in Progress (2023) at INIVA London, featuring works on paper, and living in fear of quicksand at Nunnery Gallery and Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives (2023), exploring the fragmentary nature of memory in relation to a fragile experience of home. Amidu is currently pursuing a PhD in the School of Arts & Humanities at the RCA. The title of her research is Making that Remembers: a Correspondence Between Emotion and Material. In the UK public domain her work is represented in the Victoria & Albert Museum collection, Brunel University, Westminster City Council, and Arnolfini Collection Trust, Bristol.

Related books

‘Art Installation at Railway Station’, Mid Sussex Times, 20 August 2020, p. 38
Monique Kerman, Contemporary British Artists of African Descent and the Unburdening of a Generation (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017)
Rob Stones ed., Key Sociological Thinkers (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), p. 282
Felicity Heywood, ‘Shaping the Past’, Museums Journal, Vol. 107, March 2007, pp. 20-21, 23
Monique Fowler-Paul, ‘Growing Pains: Gender and the Legacy of Black British Art’, dissertation, University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies (2007)
Diverse Cultures: an Open Exhibition of Work by Makers Living in Britain of African, Afro-Caribbean, Middle or Far Eastern Origin (London: Crafts Council, 1990)

Public collections

Arnolfini Collection Trust, Bristol

Related organisations

Book Works (trustee)
Crafts Council (trustee)
Eduardo Paolozzi Travel Bursary (recipient)
People United (trustee)
Prince’s Youth Business Trust Award (recipient)
St. Helens College of Art and Design, Merseyside (student)
Royal College of Art (student)
S G Warburg Grant (recipient)
Stuart Hall Foundation (trustee)
West Surrey College of Art and Design (now the University for the Creative Arts), Farnham (student)
Wingate Scholarship (recipient)
The Churchill Fellowship (recipient)

Selected exhibitions

Living in Fear of Quicksand, Nunnery Gallery, Bow Arts Trust and Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives, London (2023)
Untitled: an INDEX Exhibition of Works in Pogress, Stuart Hall Library, INIVA, London (2023)
Unruly Encounters, group exhibition, Southwark Park Galleries, London (2022)
1973, Making Space, Fabrica, Brighton (2019)
Constructed Geographies, group exhibition, ONCA Gallery, Brighton (2019)
2015, Parliament in the Making, group exhibition, Houses of Parliament, London (2015)
Workforce (a Work in Progress), National Maritime Museum, London (2014)
Dolphin Loves Disco (and other favourite words), group exhibition, PEER, London (2012)
In and Out of Site, group exhibition, PEER, London (2010)
Finders, Keepers..., Horniman Museum & Gardens, London (2001)
Maria Amidu: Translucent Words, Foyer Gallery, Surrey Institute of Art and Design (2000)
exChanges, group exhibition, 198 Contemporary Arts & Learning, London (1999)
The Glass Show, London (1993)
Diverse Cultures, Crafts Council, London (1990)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Maria Amidu]

Ben Uri Research Unit

for the study and digital recording of the Jewish, Refugee and wide Immigrant contribution to British visual culture since 1900.

Maria Amidu artist