Emma Van Leest is The Lock-Up’s current Artist in Residence. She has undertaken two residency periods to inform the creation of new work commissioned as part of Ash Island and its Transformations.

In May she visited for two weeks, meeting with the other locally based artists in the show, spending time out at Kooragang ‘Ash’ Island, researching the history of the site and starting to create new work for the show. In August she has returned to finalise and install her work and participate in the ‘In Conversation’ event on 6 September.

Emma is a paper-cutting artist from Melbourne, Australia. She graduated from RMIT University with a Fine Art Degree (Honours) in 2000.  She has exhibited extensively across Australia, including recent solo exhibitions at John Buckley Gallery in Melbourne and Olsen Irwin in Sydney (who represent her). She also recently appeared in “Cut” at USQ and was shortlisted for the Hazelhurst Works on Paper and National Works on Paper Awards.  

Her work has been included in several recent international exhibitions, including survey exhibitions “The First Cut” at Manchester Art Gallery in the United Kingdom and “Myths and Legends of the World” at Aram Nuri Art Gallery in Goyang, South Korea. In 2008 she undertook a residency at the Sanskriti Kendra in New Delhi, India with assistance from the Australia Council and Australia Business Arts Foundation. She has also travelled to China and Indonesia on research trips with the assistance of the Australia Council.

Visit Emma’s blogspot:
http://emmainnewcastle.blogspot.com.au/ 

Image: Emma tracing. Courtesy of Emma Van Leest