Patricia Piccinini & Joy Hester : through love

Melbourne : TarraWarra Museum of Art, November 2018. Quarto, pictorial laminated boards, illustrated endpapers, pp. 126, illustrated. New copy.

Catalogue for an Exhibition held at TarraWarra Museum of Art from 24 November 2018 – 11 March 2019.

‘Love and intimacy are the focus of this major exhibition that pairs the work of globally renowned artist Patricia Piccinini with that of important Australian modernist Joy Hester.

Patricia Piccinini & Joy Hester: Through love … presents more than 50 works, including a major new sculpture by Piccinini and rarely-seen works by Hester, that show the incredible spectrum of human and non-human relationships, from romantic love and maternal devotion through to the connections formed between humans and animals, and animate and inanimate objects.

Melbourne-based artist Piccinini is known for her large-scale, life-like sculptures of hybrid forms that often fuse together human and animal characteristics to examine the increasingly blurred boundary between the artificial and natural worlds. Her early practice was profoundly influenced by the work of Hester (1920-60), a member of Melbourne’s ‘Heide circle’ who was acclaimed for highly personal brush and ink drawings that evoked emotional extremes from passion to loneliness.

In a world first, Through love … exhibits Hester’s ink and paper works as touchstones for Piccinini’s extraordinary sculptures, photography, video works and drawings. Alongside a new work developed especially for TarraWarra Museum of Art, Piccinini is represented by some of her most important sculptures including The Young Family 2002; Nest 2006; Doubting Thomas 2008; The Lovers 2011; Kindred 2018; and TarraWarra Museum of Art collection work Thicker Than Water 2007.’ – the publisher