65 \ ALTITUDE connect me to this place. It’s also my way of saying thank you to the nature that welcomes and inspires me,” she confides. Her work is rooted in a powerful feminine symbolism. For a long time, Mariuca Bala painted women. Then, in Valais, she encountered the famous “Reines d’Hérens” — the combat cows that clash in the alpine pastures. “The first time, I thought I was photographing bulls. Then I realized they were females — mothers, warriors,” she says, laughing. That revelation continues to resonate deeply within her. To her, these queens embody the image of today’s women — strong, free, courageous, yet always life-giving. In her studio, Bala enjoys blurring the boundaries between artistic forms. “I think I’m more of a sculptor than a painter. I don’t like flatness,” she smiles. Her ideas often come from fleeting emotions — moments just before sleep or at dawn, in that suspended space between dream and consciousness. She quickly sketches a drawing so as not to forget. Her creations are born of intuition, of memory, of a fragment of beauty she seeks to capture. BRINGING PLACES BACK TO LIFE Mariuca Bala is now carrying out a major artistic project — creating a series of paintings dedicated to Sierre, Crans-Montana, and the people who make their hearts beat. To feed this work, she will weave a collective energy by bringing together artists, artisans, shopkeepers, creators, and winemakers through a series of gatherings at Le Terminus, starting this winter.
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