Maria Barnas (1973) is a poet, writer, critic, and visual artist. She studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie and the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. Her poetry debut, Twee zonnen (Two Suns, 2003), won the C. Buddingh’ Prize, and in 2009 she received the J.C. Bloem Prize for Er staat een stad op (A City Rises, 2007). Her collection Ja, ja, de oerknal (Yeah-yeah the Big Bang), was nominated for the 2014 VSB Poetry Prize. Her most recent collection Nachtboot (2018) was nominated for the De Grote Poëzieprijs 2019.