26 May - 13 June 2005
about the exhibition
Melinda Schawel is a painter and printmaker, as well as a seasoned traveller, who is inspired by her cultural experiences and the ways in which people communicate. Her current work is about communication via correspondence. While residing in Europe for the past four years, she has been collecting letters, postcards and photographs, dating back to the late 1800s. The works in this exhibition explore the timeless and universal qualities inherent in the found documents. They are a connection to the past but also describe events and places we can relate to in the present day. There is still a need to correspond about the events in our daily lives but electronic media has drastically altered the ways in which we communicate. These works are a reminder of the investment once made in personal relationships – putting pen to paper, buying a stamp, trekking to the post office.
Born in Illinois, USA, Melinda Schawel received a BA in Fine Art and Communication from the University of California Santa Barbara in 1993 and a Postgraduate Degree in Printmaking from RMIT in 1996. She has exhibited regularly since 1995 and has been selected for a number of large commissions including the Westin Hotel, Sydney and the Park Hyatt Hotel, Melbourne. Her work has been published by Murtra Edicions in Spain and is represented in numerous collections including the National Gallery of Australia and the Royal Museum of Fine Art, Antwerp, Belgium.