Feature Artist, Luisa Manea
Crystalbrook Bailey x Luisa Manea
Discover the versatile and expressive world of Luisa Manea, whose art moves seamlessly across mediums to tell stories of texture, form, and imagination. Explore her work as Crystalbrook Bailey’s feature artist for December 2025 and January 2026. Luisa's exhibition has been proudly supported by the Regional Arts Development Fund, which has helped bring these works to the public.
The exhibition Languages of Surfaces will be on display from 1 December 2025 until 30 January 2026, in the Crystalbrook Bailey lobby.
Luisa's work is a vibrant exploration of material and meaning. From painting and ceramics to fibre art, sculpture, collages, and doll-making, her pieces invite viewers to experience stories through both sight and touch. Each work embodies her playful yet considered approach, capturing the poetry of materials and the richness of layered surfaces.
Meet the artist
Luisa Manea is an award-winning artist whose decades-long career spans painting, sculpture, ceramics, fashion, and fibre art. Beginning in fashion with nationally recognised couture gowns, she expanded her practice into oils, acrylics, ceramics, sculptural forms, and hand-crafted textiles and dolls. Her works have been exhibited across North Queensland in leading galleries including Tanks Arts Centre, Cairns Art Gallery, Northsite, and the Perc Tucker Gallery, and are held in private collections nationwide.
For Luisa, surfaces are never silent. A brushstroke in oil or acrylic carries immediacy and emotion. A fired ceramic form whispers of earth and transformation. A hand-stitched textile recalls rhythm and labour. A sculptural figure or doll holds presence and intimacy. By weaving together these diverse practices, Manea creates cohesive bodies of work that invite viewers to step into an atmosphere of layered meaning.
Languages of Surfaces celebrates the act of making as a form of storytelling. It honours the richness of materials and the poetry of their union. In this exhibition, beauty is not singular but multi-faceted, discovered in the shifting interplay of medium, memory, and imagination.
We invite you to join us for the exhibition opening night and artist talk on Friday, 5 December 2025, from 6:00pm. It’s free to attend, with drinks available for purchase at CC's Bar & Grill.
Key dates:
1 December 2025: Exhibition preview.
5 December 2025: Languages of Surfaces exhibition opening night and meet-and-greet with Luisa, from 6:00pm.
30 January 2026: Exhibition closes.
Where: Crystalbrook Bailey lobby, 163 Abbott St, Cairns
All artworks on display are available to purchase via Luisa's website - Find out more
Crystalbrook Collection acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land we live, work, and stand on. We acknowledge their continuing living culture, connection to land, waters and community, and extend our respect to Elders both past and present and upcoming future leaders.
