I explore and analyse various topics and themes through my visual art practice. The two broad topics are those addressing the mis-representation of women's images and exploring how to depict the landscape through knowledge of its transformation and metamorphosis.
The source of these conversations in paint by way of psychological portraits and self-portraits as well as archaeological landscapes varies with different subject matter. The activities, people and terrains that I have depicted contained elements of poetics, metaphor and symbolism sourced from art history, archaeology, psychology and geology. My compositions continued to expand into a wider context realising gender balance as well as the depiction of land as sacred.
As a result my ideas encompass specificity, authenticity and feminist values that rely on a close affinity with family members, close friends as well as trips to various landforms where I spend time absorbing their essence. I express the invisible aspects of people, identity and landscape which come together and join with their visible features. In order to achieve this melding of the visible and invisible I used various painting techniques, devices and compositional elements to the desired effect In this way I continue researching meaning, origin, identity and their contexts as a way to inform my work.
Tags: Elaine d'Esterre, contemporary art, oil paintings, gouache, ink and pastel, ink and charcoal, intaglio, chine-colle, fumage, surreal expressionism, surreal art, surreal artist, original artwork, artist, painter
