eX De Medici is an Australian artist, whose works include Installation art, painting, photography, and drawing. Her works often deal with concepts of power and violence, and recurring motifs include skulls, helmets, guns and the swastika symbol. She has exhibited widely across Australia and is included in the collections of the

National Gallery of Australia The National Gallery of Australia (NGA), formerly the Australian National Gallery, is the national art museum of Australia as well as one of the largest art museums in Australia, holding more than 166,000 works of art. Located in Canberra in th ...

(NGA),

Canberra Museum and Gallery Canberra Museum and Gallery is an art gallery and museum in Canberra, the capital of Australia. It is located in Civic Square, on London Circuit, in Civic in the centre of the city. The gallery was opened on 13 February 1998. The museum house ...

, Australian state galleries and in private collections. de Medici was an Artist Fellow at the CSIRO for more than a decade, was awarded a print making fellowship in 2006, and was an official war artist for The

Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands The Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI), also known as Operation Helpem Fren, Operation Anode and Operation Rata (by New Zealand), began in 2003 in response to a request for international aid by the Governor-General of Solom ...

. She will be a featured artist in the NGA's major exhibition in 2020-2021, ''Know My Name,'' that will feature Australian women artists 1900 to today.

Early life and education

The artist was born 12 April 1959 at Coolamon, in the

Riverina The Riverina () is an agricultural list of regions in Australia, region of south-western New South Wales, Australia. The Riverina is distinguished from other Australian regions by the combination of flat plains, a climate with significant seaso ...

district in south western

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

. but grew up in

Canberra Canberra ( ; ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the Federation of Australia, federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's list of cities in Australia, largest in ...

, ACT. She attended the

Canberra School of Art The Australian National University (ANU) is a public research university and member of the Group of Eight, located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton encompasses seven teaching and research colleges, in addition ...

, combining performance, installation and photography in her fine art degree. In 1988, while in Melbourne, she received her first tattoo. For the next 12 years she worked as a tattoo artist. She was awarded an Australian Council Overseas Development Grant and apprenticed to a tattoo artist in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

. During the 1990s she exhibited photographs and drawings of her tattoo work.

Work

Active in the Canberra Arts Community, eX de Medici participated in a working group supporting the establishment of a

Contemporary Art Space Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from about 1945 to the present. In the social sciences, contemporary history is also continuous with, and related t ...

, which held a public meeting at Gorman House in Braddon ACT in 1986. The invitation to the opening of the Canberra Contemporary Art Space notes "an exhibition of site specific works" including her work (July - August 1987). In 1998 she saw

botanical art Botanical illustration is the art of depicting the form, color, and details of plant species. They are generally meant to be scientifically descriptive about subjects depicted and are often found printed alongside a botanical description in boo ...

paintings of Australian native flora painted in the early nineteenth century in

watercolour Watercolor (American English) or watercolour ( Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin 'water'), is a painting method"Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to the ...

. Seeing a connection between the detailed paintings and her own tattoo art, eX de Medici began painting in watercolour in a highly detailed style. De Medici then lived for 18 months (1998 - 2000) on

Norfolk Island Norfolk Island ( , ; ) is an States and territories of Australia, external territory of Australia located in the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and New Caledonia, directly east of Australia's Evans Head, New South Wales, Evans Head and a ...

working on a large watercolour painting containing details of flowers, fruit, porcelain and skulls which referenced her own family history. This work, entitled ''Blue ower/Bauer' 1998-2000, was purchased by the National Gallery of Australia in 2004 and will feature in the NGA's Know My Name exhibition in Canberra over 2020/21. Back in Australia, she began work on a detailed painting of moths. She turned to Australia's science organisation

CSIRO The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency that is responsible for scientific research and its commercial and industrial applications. CSIRO works with leading organisations arou ...

for help and for twelve years worked with them as an Artist Fellow. In 2006 de Medici was awarded APW Collie Print Trust Printmaking Fellowship. In 2009, she was an official war artist for the

Exhibitions

An untitled photocopy piece appeared at the Bitumen River Gallery exhibition "The Printed Image" (April–May 1986). She was among artists appearing in the Australia & Regions Artists' eXchange (ARX87),

Perth Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

and

Fremantle Fremantle () () is a port city in Western Australia located at the mouth of the Swan River (Western Australia), Swan River in the metropolitan area of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth. The Western Australi ...

, Western Australia in September 1987. The ARX87 June Newsletter described her (as) "producing a work in two parts, one for Canberra and one for Perth, utilizing photocopiers and generating images in response to the Perth locality, placed in public spaces with regular changes." Her "Scenes from an Ivory Tower" was exhibited in 1987 at "Utopia Nowhere", Gallery 111, Canberra. The work also appeared at The Canberra Contemporary Art Space (May–June 1988), and The Australian Centre for Photography (April–May 1989). The Australian Centre for Photography Exhibition Programme described the work as "A large scale work in composite laser photocopy...a long-term working title for a view from the Political Capital. The work addresses...the 'Violent Act', particularly those perpetrated by women on women, and the cultural positioning of the 'victor' and victim'." Text works eX de Medici were performed at Galerie Constantinople,

Queanbeyan Queanbeyan ( ) is a city in south-eastern New South Wales, Australia, located adjacent to the Australian Capital Territory in the Southern Tablelands region. Located on the Queanbeyan River, the city is the council seat of the Queanbeyan-Pale ...

in December 1988. A colour screenprint titled ''Alexis says desire drules, Ok'' was included in "Posters - the politics of life" at aGOG in Canberra in April 1989. Her painting ''Cure For Pain'' was a major donation to the

Australian War Memorial The Australian War Memorial (AWM) is a national war memorial, war museum, museum and archive dedicated to all Australians who died as a result of war, including peacekeeping duties. The AWM is located in Campbell, Australian Capital Territory, C ...

in 2017, made by Erika Krebs-Woodward through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program. In 2020-21 her work, ''The wreckers,'' was shown in Part One of the exhibition, " Know my name: Australian women artists 1900 to now" at the National Gallery of Australia.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:de Medici, eX 1959 births Living people Australian contemporary artists Women's Art Register artists