Maria Jarema was a Polish painter and sculptor, and an author of set designs. She was educated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków, in the studio of Xawery Dunikowski (she studied sculpture). She was a co-founder of the avant-garde and radical left-wing Grupa Krakowska. She worked closely with Tadeusz Kantor and Cricot 2. Before the outbreak of World War II, she worked mainly in sculpture, which she abandoned after the war for painting. In 1956, she was nominated for the Guggenheim Prize, and in 1957 she received the City of Kraków Award for lifetime achievement in art. Her most outstanding works today are considered to be her series of monotypes, created a few years before her death.