Roswell Artist-in-Residence: Masha Sha

RAiR Foundation resident artist Masha Sha has been working on a series of large scale drawings emphasizing the graphic and poetic nature of words. As a Russian artist living in the United States, Masha is engaging in a visual relationship with language that is always in a state of improvisation. The complexities and excitement involved in excavating meanings from words and phrases is a major part of Masha’s interest. Her curiosity about language grows out of a love for literature as well as a sense of being a stranger to the written word. Masha Sha’s exhibition UNSAID opens at RMAC on April 30th.

Masha was born in Chukotka, Russia in 1982. She completed an undergraduate degree at the University of Culture and graduated from Pro Arte Institute in Saint Petersburg. She then received an MFA in Media Studies from the University at Buffalo, NY as a Fulbright Scholar. Her continued curiosity in the moving image lead her to complete The L. Jeffrey Selznick School of Film Preservation in Rochester, NY. She primarily works in the mediums of drawing and video. Masha received the International Award of Recognition from STRABAG in Vienna, Austria as well as the Young Artist Prize “Innovation” in Moscow, Russia. Her works are in the collection of the Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art, The Russian Museum in Saint Petersburg, Strabag Collection in Vienna and private collections.