Breaking Ground 2013 award winner Aleksandra Antic will open her exhibition, Echo, on 3 July at the Adelaide Festival Centre’s Artspace Gallery.
The Auburn based, Belgrade-born artist is the second recipient of Country Arts SA’s prestigious Breaking Ground Visual Artist Professional Development Award.
Aleksandra is an interdisciplinary artist working in drawing, painting, screen print, mixed media and installation. Informed by personal life experiences, her work explores the dichotomy between society and the individual and, in particular, human resilience towards societal pressures and complexities.
Inspired by the Greek myth of Echo, her work, in the exhibition of the same name, is exploring the boundary of communication and its impact on the establishment of self-identity.
“I am drawn to explore the myth. It allows for analogies with my migrant experience and the realisation that, in spite of my best efforts, the full finesse of the English language is beyond my reach,” Aleksandra said. “The figure of Echo strongly conceptualises the idea that our sense of self relies on acceptance from others, with our capacity to communicate playing the crucial role.”
The exhibition comprises drawings, prints and installations. Some aspects, such as the extensive use of black ink in drawings and prints or dimmed light in the installation work, are intended to contribute to the overall sense of near darkness of the forest.
“I wanted to create an immersive atmosphere, distinct from the outside world of noise, in which the works could more potently evoke the viewer to consider the story,” Aleksandra said. “I am hoping that voicing out Echo’s persona through the silence of image will instigate thoughts on contemporary challenges of connectedness with others and, ultimately, with our self.”
Aleksandra has exhibited in a number of group exhibitions, most recently the Helpmann Academy Graduate Exhibition and as a finalist of Limestone Coast Art Prize. Since 2009, Aleksandra has had four subsequent solo exhibitions, the latest including Playhouse at Prospect Gallery (Adelaide, 2011) and Soothest Sleep at Artlab (Adelaide, 2012). Her work is held in private collections in New South Wales, South Australia, Greece, Finland and Serbia.
The Breaking Ground Award is valued at $15,000 and provides a practising visual artist from regional South Australia with the opportunity to develop a body of work for exhibition at the Adelaide Festival Centre’s Artspace Gallery and undertake an exclusive mentorship with an established professional artist.
Alexandra’s 2013 Breaking Ground exhibition will be on show at Adelaide Festival Centre’s Artspace Gallery from 3 July until 25 August.
Gallery opening times:
Wed, Fri, Sat, Sun: 12pm – 4pm
Thurs: 12pm – 8pm.
Image: Aleksandra Antic, Infinite Digression (detail), Screen print and ink on paper, 90 x 70 cm
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