Australian artist Miranda Skoczek investigates the history of visual culture and image making with her canvasses that feature a ‘remix’ and sampling of traditional decorative iconography that has existed throughout the ages. Skoczek creates artworks of luxury and ornamentation with fantastical flora and fauna motifs. The codes and symbols the artist employs are highly personal but yet remain an accessible language to others. Her opulent works celebrate an eternal beauty and goodness in image making.
Embroidery, folk art, Chinese and Japanese prints, Mughal miniatures, Islamic architecture, and popular culture are some of the cultural references which permeate the canvasses. The works merge the abstract the representational, high art and popular culture and
nature with decorative culture. The works are designed to effect the viewer, to transport them to a sometimes whimsical mythological space, an atmosphere saturated in colour and emotive forms.
The multiplicity of elements are harmonized in the built up canvasses, giving them a sense of history – in a sense they record the journey of the artist searching for beauty.
Skoczek has exhibited widely in Australia since graduating from her Fine Arts degree in 2004.
Education
Bachelor of Fine Arts-Painting
- Victorian College of the Arts
Diploma of Visual Art-Painting
- Victoria University of Technology
Diploma of Applied Arts and Graphic Design
- Canberra Institute of Technology
Solo Exhibitions
2008
- ‘The Beautiful and the Good’ Gilligan Grant Gallery, Melbourne
2005
- ‘Recent Paintings’ Alafia, Melbourne
2004
- ‘Seeking, Seeing, Finding’ Intrude Gallery, Mel
2001
- ‘Visual Eclectica’ Gallery 11, Melbourne
Group Exhibitions
2008
- ‘New Artists’ Gilligan Grant Gallery
2007
- ‘Troop’ Gilligan Grant Gallery
2006
- Salt Contemporary Art, Queenscliff, Victoria
2005
- ‘The Chandelier show’ Ladner & Fell Gallery, Melbourne
2004
- ‘Graduation Show’, Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne
2003
- ‘The Wall’, VCA, Southbank, Melbourne
2002
- ‘Proud’, VCA Gallery, Southbank, Melbourne
- ‘Postcard Show’, Linden Gallery, Melbourne
2001
- ‘VUT Graduate Show’, Span Gallery, Melbourne
- ‘Senini Prize Exhibition’, McLelland Gallery, Victoria
Prizes
2004
- $1000 Painting Prize
- VCA Graduate Show
Reviews
2008
- Art Almanac profile Janice McCulloch
- The Age, Domain by Kerrie O’Brien
- The Age, Sightlines by Frances Johnston
2007
- Inside Out magazine by Jason Grant
Publications
2008
4cats Art Education, Studio Arts Preparation by Philip Grant and
Therese Grant
