COMA is pleased to announce the representation of Renée Estée (b. 1993). The artist will be presenting her debut exhibition with the gallery this coming July, taking place at COMA Darlinghurst. Estée will also be included in the galleries’ presentation at the 2023 edition of Sydney Contemporary.
Estée is an Australian-born, New York-based artist. The artist is a recent Hunter MFA Graduate and previously graduated with a BFA Honors (First Class Honors) from the Victorian College of the Arts (Melbourne, Aus) in 2016.
Linking ideas and imagery of the Australian Outback, Hauntology, Orphism and contemplations of afterlife beliefs, Renée’s practice highlights myth-making and rituals surrounding mourning, celebration and commemoration. Operating as visual love letters and epitaphs, her large-scale oil paintings coalesce figuration and abstraction to conjure spaces where she can commune with the deceased and contend with future loss. Taking on apparitional characteristics; figures materialize from layered, loose, gestural mark-making that merge in and out of their surrounding environments, whilst animals wander in the peripheries, simultaneously observing departures and transformations taking place. Carving out spaces from thick impasto marks alongside thin washes and surface stains, Renée considers painting’s ability to omit and transfigure.
