Salwa

Sofia Cristanti is a Saint John NB based artist. She was born and raised in Indonesia. She aspired to have a career as an artist back when she was in Indonesia, receiving a Fine Art degree majoring in painting in 2002, and a Master of Business Administration in 2005 from the Institute of Technology Bandung (ITB), Indonesia. However, she had to put a pause in her artistic career due to personal and economic circumstances, she left Indonesia and headed abroad. She immigrated to Canada in 2010 as an immigrant worker. She received the Cultural Diversity Award from Edmonton Art Council in 2011, it was granted to recognize artists from all parts of the world to enrich Edmonton’s cultural scene. Therefore, she started over creating artworks after a pause for five years. She has received many awards and grants since residing in Canada. Sofia Cristanti has focused on conceptual art and had been working with many medium like painting, art installation, video art, and art performance when she was in Indonesia. Recently, she is focusing on painting with many painting mediums, and fibre art focusing on contemporary tapestry weaving. Her interest subject matters are human behaviour, popular culture, feminist study, philosophy, political and social issues, culture, nature and its relationship that happens in her daily life. She believes in research and planning to embody her artworks, and it is her way to decide what medium, style, and technique that suits to develop the subject matter. During her immigrant life in Canada she has faced many challenges as a first generation immigrant, one of them is how to maintain mental health. Her time was minimal when she had a full time job that demanded physical energy and mental health. It is a really a big challenge for her to maintain life balance between emotional, physical, and spiritual needs, also balancing time between family, social life, and work. Creating artworks has increased her awareness, given her mental and spiritual therapy, deeper meaning to what and how she sees the world, to see the beauty in reality. She likes to share the wisdom of her art journey. In her perspective, living with creative thinking gives life more joy, mindfulness, softness, and wisdom.