Biosketch
Olivia Maday is a multidisciplinary artist working in video, sound and installation. She holds an Master of Fine Arts in Studio Art from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University and a Bachelor Fine Arts in Film and Television from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Her research investigates the representation of women in Western media and art history, reimagining gendered power structures and challenging legacies of objectification. Through on-screen performance and multi-channel installation, she asserts her own agency within the film and media landscape, employing elements of the grotesque to subvert traditions of voyeurism that have historically rendered women as passive objects of visual consumption.
Maday’s recent work includes "Chthonic Ode," a nine-channel video and sound installation inspired by the Greek myth of Persephone. The work reclaims female agency through a reinterpretation of a narrative historically defined by vulnerability and subjugation, re-centering Persephone as a figure of autonomy, resilience, and transformation. Presented in her 2025 solo exhibition, "Without the Divine," at Living Arts of Tulsa in Oklahoma, the project illuminates the latent power embedded within the myth, inviting viewers to reconsider familiar stories from a perspective of female empowerment.
Maday’s work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Hochschule für bildende Künste in Hamburg, Germany, and the Czong Institute for Contemporary Art in Gimpo, South Korea. She was the 2023 recipient of the Hamburg Exchange Fellowship through Tufts University and has been additionally supported by awards such as the Montague International Travel Grant and the Becker Emergency Artist Grant. In addition to her studio practice, Maday has contributed to the curatorial field as co-curator of "It Followed Me Home" at Gallery 263 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Before joining University of Massachusetts Lowell, she served as the post-graduate teaching fellow in Curatorial Practice and Media Arts at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University.
Selected Awards and Honors
- Becker Emergency Artist Grant, Cambridge Art Association (2025)
- Post-Graduate Teaching Fellowship, School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (2024)
- Montague International Travel Grant, School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (2023)
- Hamburg Exchange Fellowship, School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University and University of Fine Arts Hamburg (2023)
Selected Artistic and Professional Performances and Exhibits
- Without the Divine, Solo Exhibition, Living Arts of Tulsa, Tulsa, OK (2025)
- Fleisch, Solo Exhibition, Mission Hill Gallery, Boston, MA (2023)
- Waking the Witch: Rumination on Feminine Rage, Group Exhibition, Living Arts of Tulsa, Tulsa, OK (2025)
- Pulling Teeth and Jumping Rope, Group Exhibition, Tufts University Art Galleries, Medford, MA (2024)
- Portrait 2024, Group Exhibition, Czong Institute for Contemporary Art Museum, Gimpo, South Korea (2024)
- The Magic Silver Show: The Elena Diane Curris Juried Photography Exhibition, Group Exhibition, Clara M. Eagle Gallery, Murray, KY (2023)
- Art School Alliance Open Studios, Group Exhibition, Hochschule für bildende Künste, Hamburg, Germany (2023)
- Vibrant Matter, Group Exhibition, Weems Center Gallery at School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, Boston, MA (2023)
- To Whom it May Concern, Group Exhibition, Mission Hill Gallery, Boston, MA (2023)
- Hot Babes Inside, Group Exhibition, Weems Center Gallery at School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, Boston (2022)