It was a go to to Dromkeen in Victoria’s Macedon Ranges as a baby that first impressed Silvia Sellitto’s inventive endeavours. The historic cottage is house to illustrations from kids’s books, and Silvia remembers “standing there, telling myself, and considering to myself, I need to have the ability to do that sooner or later.” The dimensions, method and surreal worlds depicted within the illustrations struck a chord in her younger thoughts.

There’s artwork in each nook and cranny of Silvia’s house.

Observing the real looking drawings of her mom and cousin drove Silvia to good her method. She remembers spending hours copying photographs out of books and attempting to grasp drawing in a practical type.

Silvia’s home is stuffed with quirky prospers which enhance her artwork assortment.

These days, Silvia attracts inspiration from her kids. She’s fascinated by the methodology and course of her children make use of to create surreal outcomes. The truth is, she’s so captivated by their work that she reimagines it in her personal items. Their work helps her to “get in contact with my inside playfulness.” Her latest collection, Depart the Evening Gentle On, exemplifies this strategy. Within the collection, she painted portraits of her kids holding up masks they created themselves.

A Wordless Scream, from Silvia’s Depart The Evening Gentle On collection.

“I’m reconnecting with a considerably ‘misplaced’ side of my early childhood art-making strategies. I largely recall that artwork to me was attaining a likeness of the topic/object – my kids’s artwork then again is so imaginary & otherworldly, that it permits me to find these visible components inside myself and weave them into my compositions.”

Working from house requires a devoted area, and Silvia has managed to carve out a small nook to create her work in.

It’s the darker components of her kids’s work that mesmerise Silvia. Whereas not all her kids’s artworks are creepy, these are those that Silvia is drawn to essentially the most. She explains her fascination – “together with the playful, lighthearted aspect of life, there’s additionally a creepy aspect.” The darker aspect of life has at all times intrigued her, and since having kids, her work has referenced “fears and anxieties that include parenthood.”

Silvia counts many well-known artists amongst her influences. The listing is in depth, and contains  Patricia Piccinini, Louise Bourgeois, Cindy Sherman, Francisco Goya, Invoice Henson and Charles Blackman.

The masks from her piece A Wordless Scream.

Having explored many alternative mediums, Silvia prefers to make use of a mixture of all of them in her work. Up to now, she’s experimented in collage, pictures, illustration, and oil paint on many alternative surfaces. Whereas she has her preferences, her alternative of medium is at all times dependant on the idea she needs to painting. Her most up-to-date collection, Finish of an Period, was predominantly accomplished in combined media.

Silvia paints portraits of her kids when they’re born, which now dangle of their bed room.

As a result of Silvia works from her house in Melbourne, her work is commonly accomplished throughout the few hours her household is out of the home. “I be certain that I utilise the time I’ve received with out anybody else round me.” she explains. As a result of her area is small, her entire home turns into her studio. She drags her bigger items out onto the eating room desk, and works fortunately away till it’s time to pack all of it away once more earlier than her kids come house from faculty. Whereas this sounds chaotic, it’s a system that works nicely for Silvia.

Silvia describes her portraits as very experimental. “My experimental portraiture very hardly ever exposes the precise topic/particular person – they’re nameless in a method that explores inside fragility, concealment & safety”.

Wandering round Silvia’s house, there may be not a single naked wall to be discovered. She just isn’t solely an artist, but additionally a passionate collector. Artists that may be discovered adorning her partitions embody fellow Bluethumb artist, Amos Duggan and former college students of hers, Christina Hayes and Seth Searle. As along with her personal work, these artists usually discover bizarre and creepy themes of their work. Silvia believes it’s essential for artists to gather the work of their contemporaries, “I believe it carries on that entire assist community amongst artists…it may well assist drive an artist to maintain creating, in case you’re one other artist amassing their work and being impressed by the way in which they create work.”

Take a look on the video of our chat under!

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