Marianna Auliciema was born in Canada, raised in Australia to Latvian parents, and currently lives in Latvia. She holds a B.A. (Hons) from the University of Queensland and a Graduate Certificate in Museology from Deakin University. She is one of the founders and head curator of the Latvians Abroad – Museum and Research Centre in Riga. Her research focuses on the Latvian diaspora, with particular attention to the intersections of anthropology, migration, and museology, and on developing methodologies for representing life stories and community memory within museum practice.
Marianna has led numerous projects at the museum, including the documentary films Vārpa – The Promised Land (on Latvian Baptist migration to Brazil) and Valiant: A Car, A Cause and the Cold War (on Latvian political activism in 1980s North America). She has also curated exhibitions on diaspora identity and folk costume, and directed The Story Quilt, a community heritage project involving over 1,000 contributions from Latvians abroad. She is currently leading The Taste of Home, a participatory research initiative on Latvian food traditions in the diaspora.
