Strutt's Compendium of Curiosities: Catherine & Jennifer Strutt
Presenting a classic Strutt Sister's compendium of curious assemblage works.
Twin sisters, musicians, synesthetes, artists and designers, The Strutt Sisters (Catherine & Jennifer Strutt) are a highly respected and well-known Newcastle institution. Over their combined fifty years of award-winning collaborative art making, they have inspired countless fellow visual artists, both emerging and established, have taught many classes in collage assemblage, and exhibited countless works in galleries across NSW, Tasmania and Victoria.
Within their collaborative relationship they are acutely well versed in their language of colour and pattern, design, and fabrication. Inspiration for their art making lies in the colour, pattern, and design of traditional folk costumes from around the world, music and musical instruments, vintage everyday life, and the colour and graphic qualities of early print and advertising. The twins gather, cut, and paste paper images into collages and then use paint, timber, aluminium, resin and fabric to create their assembled and built worlds of quirky characters, stories and situations.
The unique character and technique of their work is instantly recognized as the “Strutt Sister style” and in this, their fiftieth year around the sun and their first exhibition in the Northern Rivers region, they take a celebratory look back at early, and recent pieces from their studio collection to present a classic Strutt Sisters’ compendium of curious assemblage works.
This exhibition is on view until Saturday 8 April (Easter Saturday).
Image credits:
Top: Heiress 2014, mixed media, (detail). Courtesy of the artists.
Homepage square: A Fair Lady of the Plains 2011, mixed media, (detail). Courtesy of the artists.
Slider: Yellow Tulip 2014, mixed media, (detail). Courtesy of the artists.
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