Isabelle de Kleine

Isabelle de Kleine's exhibition series 'World Was on Fire' explores the complexities, struggles and richness of human experience. The works speak of the dualities of love and loss, light and dark, the web of experience that weaves together the beautiful and flawed tapestry of ourselves.

Says de Kleine: "The figures depicted are envoys of my contemplations on identity and the psyche. When realisation comes that our reality is fabrication, when we understand the fallibility of ourselves and the falsities we have created; what remains? Who do we become? The works depict the liminal space that we occupy when we are left in loss, and the reconstruction of self that occurs in the wake of grief.

"I have taken inspiration from the Western Australian landscape; the land that burns and regrows, the harsh sun and torrential rains, magnificent gorges laced with poison, a place that reinvents itself daily and rises anew. In particular the eastern region of the Pilbara, a place of beauty and destruction. Endless spinifex-covered hills and gorges that divide the land, littered with thermal springs that flow from the disturbed earth. Skies lit both by the bright stars and the glow from distant machines. The Pilbara holds deep significance for myself as a place that marked the beginning of a new way of being. The symbiosis of this vivid place, as beautiful as it is unnerving.

"The images depict primarily female and non-binary figures that move between realism and abstraction, revelation and obfuscation. Faceted shapes, textures and colours intersect the figures, dividing and uniting them. They sit locked in a state of timelessness and quiet contemplation as the world moves around them, finding solace in this recreated land, and meaning in the aftermath."