Lea Zoraina Lim

Lea Zoraina Sindao Lim is an artist-researcher aiming to emphasize the importance of remembering and re-presenting inherited culture to today’s generation. To revive their folklore, she collects and studies accounts of Maguindanaon folktales and creates artworks for each tale. She is presently directing the animated retelling of Datu Pat I Mata or the Datu with Four Eyes, a significant folktale of the Rio Grande De Mindanao. 

She founded and is the artistic director of Folklore Pilipinas, an art group dedicated to taking care and passing on precious Filipino inherited stories. She holds a Master’s degree and a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts from the University of the Philippines, and a Bachelor’s degree in Management from the Ateneo De Manila University. She is a faculty member of the Department of Arts and Design, School of Arts, Sciences, and Education in Miriam College. She is an active member of the Filipino Portrait Artists’ Guild, and Aliguyon U.P. Folklorists Inc. Lea is notably the first female painter to win grand prize in MADE – the Metrobank Art and Design Excellence Award. Her experimental short videos have been cited favorably by the University of the Philippines and by the Cultural Center of the Philippines. She participates in art exhibits and folklore exhibits, talks, and conferences locally and internationally.  The latest ones being the SIEF Folklore Conference in UP Diliman and the Philippine Studies Symposium Translocating Textiles at the SOAS University of London as an exhibitor and speaker.

Lea was born and she grew up in Cotabato City, Maguindanao, Philippines. Her middle name Sindao is the Maguindanaon word for firelight or spark, where people of the community gather around to tell stories and learn from each other.