PRINTMAKING legend Ruth Faerber has helped channel a burning passion for all things artistic and a series of fortunate accidents into a life of innovation and purpose.
The 94-year-old printmaking pioneer has etched her name intoAustralia’s artistic history and a selection of her most impressive works on exhibition atMosmanArtGallery.
PaperVisionary; Works on paper by Ruth Faerber from the Mosman Art Collection is on display throughout January.
Ruth’s approach led to the discovery and development of a number of lithographic printmaking techniques.
She said she had always been interested in art and took art lessons at Sydney Girls’ High School, but found the classes a bit imitative.
At the age of 15, she met art teacher Gladys Gibbons and her fascination with printmaking was born.
Her fascination with the medium was only reinforced when she studied under European modernist Desiderius Orban in the late 1940s.
“He brought a lot of modernist knowledge with him and newer influences that were popular inParis at the time,” she said.
“He encouraged us to be creative and not imitative and really gave me the impetus to continue.”
Ruth hosted her first exhibition in 1963, before studying contemporary printmaking inNew York in the late ’60s.
In the ’80s she discovered some groundbreaking new techniques while learning to make her own paper.
“In the process I found that if I manipulated a sheet of paper while it was still damp, I could put it on a sculptural form and it wouldn’t dry flat,” she said.
She also developed a technique that involved allowing pulped paper to dry stiffly and use of earthy colours to give the paper a stone-like quality.
“I finished up being able to make a paper that was not just the support for the artform, but the artform itself.”
The exhibition runs until January 29.
Details (02) 9978-4178, mosmanartgallery.org.au
