Nu Yishu Series V: Viriditas, an exhibition of new collaborative art by Australian and Chinese artists, is the fifth in a series of exhibitions curated by Denise Keele-bedford, engaging with cross cultural art forms and women’s art.

The exhibition by twelve women artists; six Australians and six Chinese, consists of work created through a collaborative process where each Australian artist is partnered with an artist from China.

Celebrating the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day and the Year of Australian Culture in China, this multicultural and multi-media exhibition includes installation, painting, photography, ceramics and performance.

As an “Imagine Australia” event, the “Nu Yishu” (Female Art in Mandarin) project focuses on untangling misconceptions about the “other culture” regarding Contemporary Art Practice, broadening and opening opportunities for discussion on individual, cultural and social perspectives.

Viriditas denotes lushness and vitality. It has been translated in various ways, such as freshness, fertility, fecundity, fruitfulness, verdure, or growth.

The intention, through pairing and collaboration, is for each artist to respond to their artist partner, their art practice, philosophy, theories, techniques and influences, thereby increasing knowledge and understanding of the two cultures and delivering this to a broader audience.

All of the artists share a belief in the value of communication as a key to understanding and growth. Their experience of working together to develop a new body of work, exhibiting the works, plus a series of talks and workshops, has great benefit for their professional development and the communities they work within on urban fringes. The issues raised by this process will span what it is to be a woman making art in the relative isolation of Melbourne’s urban fringe and how that compares to the experience of an artist in the highly politicized and booming market that is China today. The exhibition considers the ability of art and art making to bridge that divide, and to encompass the intricacies of various cultural approaches.

The major difference between the Chinese and Australian artists is age. Not the age of the individual, but the age of historical development, the age of their cultures and heritages, that significantly underpins their place in the world at this time. While Chinese cultural heritage can be traced back 5000 to 6000 years and white Australia less than 250 years, indigenous Australians, represented by Koori artist Megan Cadd, have lived and developed their culture for more than 40000 years on this continent.

Artists Introduction:

Jane Annois (Ceramist) and Xu Xiaoyan (Painter)
Jane has explored different styles and techniques, including raku and 'Terre Vernisee', a French style of terracotta. Her interests are in innovative contemporary approaches to this traditional craft while using local colors and textures. Like Xu Xiaoyan, Jane is influenced by the earth and ‘the natural’, by the textural qualities of the materials. Xu Xiaoyan builds strong relief-like surfaces through the heavy application of oil paint. Both artist reference a deep and abiding interest in the environment.

Liliana Barbieri (Photographer) and Feng Ling (Performance Art)
Liliana’s work spans a variety of media including painting, installation and photography. She was born in Italy and came to Australia as a child. She has strong links with her Italian heritage that reflect in her artwork, in particular repeated use of the Madonna figure, in layered ambiguous imagery. Feng Ling has traveled to Italy and created performance pieces there, and also has an interest in the Madonna in art and culture.

Megan Cadd (Assemblage) and Huang Yin (Painter)
Megan is a self taught indigenous artist with ancestors of both Yorta Yorta and Wotjabaluk. Her work is strongly influenced by her family, and cultural heritage, and uses found objects to create assemblages with references to popular culture that tell poignant stories about her life and family. Huang Yin is also concerned with personal heritage. Huang Yin uses the figure of a boy as metaphor to explore the life of her father during the Cultural Revolution and the influence of his experiences on her life today.

Dawn Csutoros (Painter) and Xie Dong (Ceramist)
Dawn’s abstract minimal works range from luminous pastels to vibrant acrylics and more recently contemplative ink works on traditional mulberry paper. She has a long standing interest in Eastern philosophy which is explored through formal elements in her work. Through the process of hand layering pastel and pure pigment onto paper and the multilayered glazing of paint on canvas and linen, sensuality is achieved in the surface, and that attention to materiality is echoed in the work by Xie Dong’s exquisite porcelain works.

Denise Keele-bedford (Installation) and Cai Jin (Painter)
Denise uses a variety of media to reflect a conceptual engagement with cultural diversity, correlation, belief systems, rituals and associated icons. Her interests lay in the diversity of people, cultures and environments. Her signature use of red, evocative and dramatic, is echoed in the work by painter Cai Jin, who uses many surfaces as her canvas, often different objects with fabric covers. She reflects on the rich fabrics of her history and childhood around opera costumes.

Judy Trembath (Ceramist) and Gao Yuan (Photographer)
Judy creates her ceramics and commemorative commissions in her Cottles Bridge studio. Different firing techniques that cause unrestrained tonal finishes interest her. Eastern ceramic design including decal application has influenced her recent work. Both Judy Trembath and Gao Yuan engage with the idea of the domestic, and the traditional roles of women, using in Gao Yuan’s work the image of mother and child, and in Judy Trembath the domestic object.