Mariana del Castillo lives and works in Ngambri/Ngunnawal land. She is an Ecuadorian-born, Australian multidisciplinary Contemporary artist. When constructing her sculptures and installations, Mariana primarily uses reclaimed materials that come saturated with meaning. She creates her allegorical narratives by appropriating and transforming symbols and objects. Her tableaux address and question the human condition and the experience of inhabiting the body. This can be seductive and repulsive at the same time. Most recently Mariana’s works move away from the internal landscape of her personal history out into the external landscape of country.
Mariana graduated with a Bachelor of Visual Arts (Honours) from the Australian National University, School of Art in 1989. She has exhibited widely since graduating and her works are in many collections including : 2024 ACT Legislative Assembly, Canberra Museum and Gallery, Australian National University, The Parliamentary Group, KDN Group, ACT NRS Group, Mallesons Stephen & Jaques, Barristers and Solicitors, ACT and more.
Mariana has participated in numerous sculpture festivals/biennials and residences. Awarded 2023 CAPO Fellowship, 2022 Bundanon Artist in Residence, ArtsACT 2020 Homefront recipient, Belco Arts 2020 Going the Distance grant, ArtsACT, 2015 Macquarie Wealth Award, 2009 CAPO Rosalie Gascoigne award. She has had several solo exhibitions and participated in many group exhibitions. These have included 2023 Shoalhaven Regional Gallery, invited to create site specific installations: 2022 Shift: CMAG on the SQUARE, Design Festival, Re- locate, Assembly point, Southbank Melbourne, Canberra's Art Biennial: Contour 556: 2016-18,20,22, 2020 Ruination - Art not Apart, 2020 Off Balance: online videos, animations, and sculptures, Australien Canberra Contemporary Arts Space, 2019 Perceived Indifference, Glassworks Smokestack Gallery, 2015 ART + CLIMATE = CHANGE - Australian Galleries, VIC, 2015,19,20 Small works, Beaver Galleries. Previously represented by Helen Maxwell Gallery, Canberra and Maunsell Hughes Gallery, Paddington. Finalist: 2017/2022, Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize, 2018 Small Sculpture Award, Deakin University, 2017 Fishers Ghost Art Award. Her works are held in public and private collections in Australia and overseas (see CV).
Mariana is currently a Visual arts mentor for the University of Canberra Australian Defence Force Arts for Recovery program.
‘The fact that most of the materials employed in del Castillo’s sculptural tableaux have been recycled adds an additional level of social commentary on what society chooses to discard, so that this detritus can come back to haunt the society that rejected it’ –
Emeritus Professor Sasha Grishin- art historian, art critic and curator based in Australia.
