Exhibition: ‘Quiddity’ by printmaker, Elmari Steyn, is a collection of recent etchings produced in the artist’s Wonky Moon Studio located in the Southern Forests region.
The exhibition opens on Sunday 1st May at 3pm with light refreshments. Everyone is welcome to attend, meet the artist and marvel at the intricate beauty of Elmari’s work.
ARTIST STATEMENT:
Printmaking is a state of existence, of breathing and being part of a process and a slow intimate journey. This body of work is a complex framework of single-plate and composite copper-plate etchings. These plates are often found or hand-cut, etched, aquatinted then printed and overprinted, with added chine-collé and hand-colouring. Specks of 23k gold leaf suggests the gentle flow of time and fragility of all things living. Plates are used as words and symbols, often repeated, to narrate stories and sometimes to convey a specific happening within a story.
The selection of works for the Quiddity Exhibition represents fragments of stories, beliefs and every-day happenings amongst a small band of people; told through depicting the trees, boats, houses, lands, and countries they lived in and travelled through.
ABOUT THE ARTIST:
Elmari Steyn was born in Namibia, where her father was an accomplished oil painter. She grew up exploring remote desert, sea and beach landscapes of the Namib Desert and Skeleton Coast, which continue to influence her work. She completed her schooling in Namibia before studying at the University of Johannesburg, in South Africa, and later completed a Diploma in Fashion Design at the Joey Spiller Fashion Design School in Johannesburg.
She set up and owned a successful fashion design and manufacturing company (Pebbles Workshop), with several fashion labels, which operated for over 20 years. Then moved into product design and retailing of art, craft and jewellery, where she ran a number of businesses in the tourism sector in southern Africa.
In Australia since 2012, Elmari is continuing her love of the arts as an active printmaker, focussing on copper-plate etching and jewellery making. Her works reflect her love of nature and wilderness, including the relationship of individuals within nature, and the experience of transition and sense of place.
In 2015-19, Elmari worked from a studio (Wonky Moon) at the Tresillian Arts Centre in Nedlands, WA, where she also ran printmaking classes in 2016-19, with further classes at Midland Junction Arts Centre. She now resides in the Southern Forests area of WA and works from her printmaking studio there.
Through 2014 to 2021, she has participated in over 50 group, joint and solo exhibitions, and art awards, in Western Australia, Australia and the USA.
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