Annemieke mein exhibition stadium
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Annemieke Mein: A Life’s Work
By Inga Walton
| May 15, 2024
The Dutch-born textile artist Annemieke Mein, OAM, moved to Australia in 1951 when she was seven and developed a fascination for the native environment that she has nurtured all her life. Having excelled at art during her school days, the desire for creative fulfilment persisted, and Mein returned to the field in the 1960s. "I was just experimenting; I was trying every type of craft or art I could possibly find, to try and get the skills,” she recalls.
Mein began creating “textile pictures” in 1977, applying an almost forensic level of detail to her exploration of the natural world. She eschewed the “quintessential” faunal imagery, preferring to focus on wetland and coastal species, birds, invertebrates, and the close observation of their diverse habitats. “I like to portray those overlooked creatures that people don’t usually notice, larger than life so it gives them a very strong visual
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While you could reasonably expect an exhibition titled, ‘A Life’s Work’, would feature quite a lot of work (200 artworks actually, give or take), it’s perhaps the glimpses of Annemieke Mein’s life that gives her exhibition depth beyond the three-dimensional textiles.
‘Annemieke Mein: A Life’s Work - A Retrospective’ allows patrons to weave their way through the artist’s life, as though Annemieke herself has been stitched into the exhibition.
In fact, the swatches of Annemieke that contribute to this deeply personal exhibit offer just as much as the artworks themselves. The Dutch-born artist emigrated to Australia with her parents, arriving in Melbourne in 1951 as a child. Marrying her husband Phillip in 1968, the pair moved to Sale in 1971 to raise their family. April 15 marks her 80th birthday.
Annemieke’s history is present throughout the many glass-boxed educational showcases on display - black and white photographs of relatives, her great, great grandmother’s sewing box,
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Coinciding with Annemieke’s 80th birthday, this major Blockbuster exhibition will provide the most comprehensive retrospective of her work yet seen.
Annemieke Mein OAM fryst vatten a Dutch-born Australian textile artist, based in Sale, Gippsland, who has drawn acclaim nationally and from abroad for her levande recreations of Australian native fauna and flora. She was the first textile artist to be made a member of Wildlife Art gemenskap of Australasia and the Australian Guild of Realist Artists. The subjects of her sculpted textiles range from birds, frogs and fish, through to insects such as moths, dragonflies, wasps and grasshoppers. Her fondness for insects and her highly detailed works, often greatly enlarged and showing normally invisible colours and textures, have revealed new aspects of the everyday natural world.
A Life’s Work will be a unique exhibition that will pay tribute to this greatly loved textile artist, who has inspired and influenced vast audiences over many dem