GEMA ALAVA
contact@gemaalava.com

Gema Alava (Madrid, Spain, 1973) received a B.A. from the Universidad Complutense Madrid, and the Chelsea College of Art & Design, London, (1996); a Postgraduate Degree in Art Education from the Universidad Complutense, Madrid, (1997); a M.F.A. from the Academy of Art University, California (1999); and a M.F.A. from the San Francisco Art Institute, California, (2000). She is the recipient of a Penagos National Drawing Prize, Spain; an Art History Fellowship by the Ministry of Education and Sciences of Spain; an ERASMUS Fellowship; a La Caixa Foundation fellowship for Graduate studies in the USA; an AIM Program Grant from the Bronx Museum of the Arts, New York; an EMERGE Program grant from Aliira-Center for Contemporary Art, New Jersey; and a Six Week Workshop Series Grant from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, New York.

Her work has been exhibited and presented at the Rana Museum in Norway; the Solomon S. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Queens Museum of the Arts, New York; the Bronx Museum of the Arts, New York; the Cervantes Institute, New York; el Barrio Museum, New York: the Jersey City Museum, NJ; the Margulies Art Collection at the Warehouse, Miami; Galeria Fundacion Maphre, Madrid; Pabellon Maphre, Seville; the Juan Carlos I Center at New York University; Cursos de Verano El Escorial, Universidad Complutense, Madrid; the United Nations Building in New York; CUE Art Foundation, New York, NY and will be presented at Lehman College Art Gallery, New York City, in 2011.

Her art pieces have been covered by the New York Times, Diario ABC, Diario El Pais, Agencia EFE, Diario La Prensa, HITM Television, NCI Noticias, MEGA TV News, and TVE- National Television of Spain.

Alava is currently a lecturer and art educator for children, teenagers and adults at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the Solomon Guggenheim Museum, New York.