MARIA IBARRA is a Latin American artist based in Canada. She has lived in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and currently resides in Guelph, Ontario. Working under the name Feru, she has been a writer, painter, sculptor, and Illustrator, but above all a passionate lover of a medium that everyone has used at one time in their lives: plasticine. She has been working with plasticine since she was very young, and finds it to be the perfect match for the themes she shows in her art work and uses to illustrate her storybooks.
Feru's work always includes the themes of the meaning of happiness, the small details in life that make the difference, childhood dreams, all those things forgotten in our path of loosing innocence, and the unstoppable goodby of childhood. She uses a mixture of colours, thousands of plasticine dots, worked with patience and care, to form delicate and jewel-like creations.
Feru was born in Cartagena, Colombia, where the warm weather, the people, the sun, the beach, and the colourful environment, nurtured and influenced her inspiration and art work. As an emerging artist she hasn't wasted an opportunity to learn new material and technique. Her academic development has been between Colombia, Canada, EEUU, and Spain, countries that have supplemented her perspective as an artist.
Her art has been shown in more than twenty-five individual and collective exhibitions, and features in her two children's books. She has also been a tireless art teacher, spreading the importance of art and its benefits.
TITLES
For Love / Por Amor (Ediciones Pluma De Mompox, 2011)
The Story of Two Brothers / Historia de dos Hermanos (Ediciones Pluma De Mompox, 2011)