BOLDLY brings together the work of six contemporary artists who work across diverse media – painting, mosaics, ceramics and sculpture.

The exhibition is a reflection of the lives of the artists as they navigated through shared experiences of careers, motherhood and relationships as well as unique challenges of migration, surviving bushfires and personal loss, and who have boldly chosen to follow their hearts and pursue their passion for creating.

Each artist has her own unique practice and distinct style of expression through her art. The diverse works easily come together to form a rich celebration of the artists’ lives through art and healing. The artists met while participating in Banyule Open Studios. They discovered an artistic and supportive connection through their art and their shared life experiences.

BOLDLY is a celebration of the joy of life, resilience and community.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Jo Brazil is always excited and inspired to delve into different forms and mediums – from gouache to oils and acrylics to chalk and pencil. Being a poetic painter she doesn’t paint
what she sees; instead she paints feelings, reacting to her environment, social and physical. Her work is abstract expressionist in style – immediate, colourful and bold – after 35 yrs as a graphic designer her work is thoughtful, considered. Now as an art therapist she combines her design focus with creativity as a process for healing. Often making political statements through her work – never shying away from the inner transformative outcome.

The feminine form has been used throughout the vastness of human history to convey messages of origin, hope, fertility, passion, nurturing and struggle.

Josephine Cassar is a studio-based ceramic artist and pottery teacher. Her work is a combination of wheel thrown and hand building techniques. As a first-generation migrant, Josephine’s practice is deeply rooted in her Mediterranean island heritage while being inspired by the unique landscapes of her adopted homeland. Her work reflects her space between her past and her present.
Josephine has a deep interest in cultures and people. She travels extensively and has participated in many workshops and residences in Europe and the USA. These adventures are her source of inspiration and sustain her passion for learning and for developing her art.

Tracey Marsten, ceramic artist and teacher finds inspiration from these messages that are often forgotten. Clay is instrumental in conveying the emotion and fluidity of life and the permanence of an event enacted and prescribed to the past as history to be retold as a memory, a fable, a myth, a truth or musing. Once made, clay is permanent. The feminine formed in clay encompasses these experiences in peoples’ lives and amplifies the permanent shifts they create.

Inspired by function form and bold colours, Liz Notley has been working with clay as a hobby potter since 2014. In 2021 She became more focused on her art after she set up her home-based studio with a kiln and wheel. She loves experimenting with different clay, textures and glazes and she creates pieces so that each piece is unique. For this exhibition Liz has designed a series of candle stick holders “as we all need light in our lives.”

Artist, designer and musician Sonja Parkinson is passionate about sustainable arts, the environment and social justice. Sonja fell in love with the art of mosaic after losing her home in the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires and joined a group of bushfire survivors, making something beautiful from theburnt and broken remnants of their lives. She shares her love of this accessible and healing art form in mosaic workshops she teaches at Montsalvat.

Kobie Swart’s work aims to explore the narrative interplay of myth, memory and mark making. Her deceptively playful approach juggles the joyful mundane with universal themes of love, belonging, loss, and displacement. Drawing on her experience as a children’s book illustrator, the bright colours, stories and visual patterns of her South African childhood, her garden, and her love of travel, she describes her work as “material gardening” – playing with layers of texture and colour to create a visual song.