Maya Tihtiyas Attean
Maya Tihtiyas Attean (b. 1994) is a Wabanaki artist living and working in Portland, Maine. She grew up on Alnabe Menahan, or the Penobscot Reservation. Her practice has evolved to use photography as a way of creating art that reflects her ancestry, resiliency, and culture. Her experience growing up on a reservation then migrating to being a "city Indian" has given her a unique perspective of two worlds that merge together through marrying techniques of multiple cultures within her work.
She earned an associate's degree at SMCC before transferring to MECA&D where she earned her BFA in photography with honors in 2023. She currently works as a design associate, and as a photographer and story collector for Maine Wabanaki REACH. She has attended residencies at Hewnoaks and SPACE, and is currently the recipient of SPACE's rent-free studio program for BIPOC artists. Her work has been shown at Speedwell Projects, 82Parris, and MECA&D, and has been featured in the Portland Press Herald.
Image: Nsiwiyik / ancestral connections, archival print collage, 20x30", 2022