Maree Azzopardi:
Growing up in the Hawkesbury region and of Maltese heritage, Maree Azzopardi has been a practicing artist for over 30 years exhibiting regularly in Rome. Now residing on the Central Coast, her works draw on her history of practice which has focused on the Australian landscape. This series presents an evolution by Azzopardi to not only reflect on, but to incorporate in, elements of landscape to her works.
Her pieces show a confidence in working on paper and with traditional materials. Majoring in drawing from Sydney’s UNSW School of Art and Design (formally COFA) there is an appreciation that can be clearly witnessed as the artist handles large concertina books of SAR mulberry paper adorning with lashes of ink, charcoal, gold and paint. Works on paper are treated with charcoal scavenged from local beaches post flood and fire, crushed, then mopped to apply marks to paper laid onto the floor. Found objects and animal remains become treated almost in ritual performance with gold leaf, paint and charcoal and become absorbed into the canvas.
The result of her studio performances are works intricate with mark making and highly embellished with gold thread, gold leaf, echoing richly ornamented spaces usually reserved for holy practices. In these spaces Azzopardi inspects representations of the divine in the face of destruction, creating works which have direct and immediate response to the devastation of recent fire, flood, and plague.
With a history of practice spanning 30 years primarily exhibiting in Rome and Malta, Azzopardi brings elements of the coastal environment from outside to shelter to within the gallery. Through her motifs, Azzopardi offers a foundation to embark on a process of healing – like regrowth after a fire, returning to a state of beginnings, full of every potential.
Jasmine Kean.
Curator, Gosford Regional Gallery
Bind Up Your Wounds - series
This series began soon after the black summer fires as a result of driving through the fire affected area of Bells Line of Road in Bilpin where I have driven through often throughout my life on the way to Mt Wilson and Lithgow. They are small vignettes of the devastation I was witnessing yet also a moment of memory before the land regenerates itself.
Pilgrimage series of drawings
A pilgrimage is a journey, often into an unknown or foreign place, where a person goes in search of new or expanded meaning about their self, others, nature, or a higher good, through the experience. It can lead to a personal transformation. During the pandemic my pilgrimage involved a daily walk along the coastline not far from my home witnessing the effects of climate change drastically transforming the sand dunes, its spiritual significance became a metaphorical journey into my own beliefs of memory, preservation and erosion.
Drawing - "My own wings could not take me so high"
I created this image in situ at Mt Banks in the Blue Mountains as a reaction to the Black Summer Fires using mulberry folding paper, gouache & ink and what I found as a result of the fires. Burnt branches were used as charcoal and burnt animal bones were used as drawing implements. The title comes from a line in Dante’s Divine Comedy where the pilgrim is witnessing the devastation of Fire and commenting about the fallen angels themselves unable to escape the ferocious flames.
