Lily Anais ESTERHUIZEN 2024

I am interested in the natural world and have been developing methods to capture the art of mimicry experimenting through practices using natural colours, shapes and textures. Layering and perspective add to subliminal meanings.

This body of work started as an exploration of myself, my identity and what it means to be a women in our modern day and age. Knitting as the backbone to most of the artworks specifically because of what I consider a part of my identity and hand work is associated with women, exploring how ‘women’s work’ is something passed down within families alongside my journey through self. The artworks themselves are reflections of my thoughts and feelings and how I see them in my mind and what shapes they take, what colours they embody and I tried to capture their ephemeral nature as feelings and thoughts are. In some way these abstract forms are like captured specimens in their own right and I’ve taken samples of them and materialised them as a way of understanding them, making them more permanent and less fleeting.

Traditional techniques of paper making, with interest in the fragility of the paper fibres and wet- to - dry process and how you can manipulate that process, change it and integrate more within that and combining the paper with hand weaving and knitting, along with crochet create new perspectives.

These artworks emit a feeling of vulnerability and fragility as feelings often are; which is why I chose to also incorporate traditional paper making and paper as a medium in this body of work. I am very interested in the process of taking something and reprocessing it into something new and creating from that.

This body of work has an intended flow as it begins with the large, natural and muted installation then followed by the smaller and more colourful artworks and ending with the mini framed, playful pieces or “microbiomes” I like to refer to them as.

My artworks are also a personal narrative between myself and nature and how I can grow my relationship with the natural world and what inspiration I can take from it such as creeping lichen, mushrooms, corals, seaweeds, shells and bone structures. I wanted to challenge our views of closeness and integration with nature as human beings are slowly drifting further and further away from their roots.

I wish this body of work to get people to see how impactful nature still is, and in some way also bring people closer to it and make my viewer feel the closeness and be opened to natures innate beauty.