Amanda Tomasoa started her art career while living in Indonesia. After gving up her job as a language teacher to stay home with her then 4 year old son, Amanda decided to try a hand at creating art. She started selling works to friends, companies needing promotional art work and sold her ideas to a gift ware company who had huge success with her range of designs. In 1998 Amanda and her family had to leave their home and business in Indonesia no thanks to the political upheaval when President Suharto was forced down from power. They decided to settle in New Zealand where her eldest sister already resided. Amanda restarted her art career in 2004 and have been a full time artist since then. Financially it has been a struggle but there has been a lot of awesome adventures that Amanda has managed to encounter. The piece of art she sold in New Zealand was to her friend in Wellington for a couple of hundred dollars. When the client found out that someone else offered to buy the same piece for 2 grand, he was encouraged to invest in a few more of Amanda's Art. He is her most supportive client so far. Amanda went on to do 5 solo exhibitions, groups exhibitions and was invited and welcomed to show in New York, Italy, Vienna, Australia, Berlin etc. Amanda dreams of owning her own cafe gallery and using the space to also hold Artists workshops and raise fund to help the less fortunate. People, Food, Art, Books & Music are her passion and Amanda dreams of incorporating them all into her future space. Amanda was born in warm sunny Malaysia and was a shy person who lived her life through books. After finding God, she had an opportunity to travel around South Asia & the Pacific as a volunteer worker. Her experiecne living with people from 38 nations opened her eyes to a number of new things. Now Amanda is a confident person who enjoys interacting with and encouraging others. Be warned! Amanda is cheeky, emotional, has a great sense of humour. She is people centred, loves to dance, enjoys tasting new things, shopping and is still a child at heart! She hope to get to travel and taste new things again. Please do get in touch and say hello! :) |