Maria Roza, born in Baku in 1998, is a painter whose work delves into the symbolic and primal relationships between human consciousness, animality, and nature. She began her formal art training at Ankara Fine Arts High School, graduating in 2016, and completed her Bachelor’s degree with high honors in Painting at Hacettepe University. Continuing her studies at the same institution, she earned a Master’s degree, focusing her thesis on hybrid creatures and their representations in contemporary art.

Roza’s first solo exhibition, Hamartia, was held in 2019 in Ankara with the support of the Rotary Club. In 2020, she was recognized by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism’s 6th Young Art Project Competition, which awarded her for her work based on the theme Geography is Destiny. In 2022, she joined the Le Maison de Barbara artist residency program and held her second solo exhibition, Parallel Animals, at Istanbul Concept Gallery. That same year, she was selected for the BASE Young Artist Platform’s annual exhibition and she participated in the exhibition held for the opening of Istanbul’s historic Feshane Building.

Her work has been featured in prominent galleries such as Istanbul Concept Gallery, Cermodern, and Pera Palace, as well as internationally in Beirut and Kyiv. She has participated in  art fairs including ArtAnkara, ArtContact and the Love 360 Festival.

Maria Roza’s paintings explore themes of shifting dimensions of identity and the primal dialogue between human animal presence. Her work features solitary, introspective figures navigating liminal spaces and uncanny landscapes shared with animalistic beings. By contrasting the tranquility of nature with the fatigue of urban life, Maria Roza’s art opens up a world where the subconscious and primal aspects of the human psyche can be sensed, positioning nature both as a reflective space for self discovery and a quest within the possibilities of existence.