Kobo's Antoine De Villiers Featured in Art Business News
Crouched Male by Antoine De Villiers
Antoine De Villiers has been a Kobo artist since 2021, and we LOVE this girl! Her work makes you feel more alive than you can imagine. What you see in this article can be seen in person at the Gallery. This December she will be one of many artists at Miami Spectrum 2023 for Miami Art Week. Featuring contemporary art from around the world, Spectrum Miami showcases exciting and creative pieces from both established and emerging artists. Get to know the Redwood Art Group’s top artists — and our Antoine is one to know!
(As published in Art News Business, by Hannah Smith, 8 November) - Antoine de Villiers (South African, 1977) is one of life’s travelers and blessed with an artist’s soul. Antoine works in many mediums, yet, there is always something quintessential of her throughout the core of her work, like a wick in a candle drawing her creations out. During a difficult childhood as a daughter of parents struggling with mental illness, Antoine was in a devastating motorcycle accident that claimed the life of her friend/driver. Days later, the diary she kept meticulously for years was stolen and she lost her medium of expression. It is then that Antoine found her artistic voice and art became a means of survival.
Q: What is your work philosophy and how does that impact your work?
A: I want my work to be visceral, honest, and vulnerable. Early in my career, I was drawn to the human figure as my world came crashing down amid my struggle with severe depression. I found exploring the complexities of human emotion freeing, and using the subject of the figure as a means of expression. While I felt emotionally and physically out of control, my work became autobiographical and gave me much-needed relief. Philosopher Alain de Botton said that art can ‘help us to be less lonely’ and that is exactly the role it played in my life. My figures are nude, as that is the most honest and vulnerable we can be. They are usually anonymous to help empathize with the emotion captured rather than the identity of the subject. But ultimately, as William Kentridge aptly noted, no matter what subject you choose, it will always be a self-portrait.
Q: What artist(s) inspire you?
I love art and can never get enough of it. From old masters like da Vinci and Turner. Modernists like O’Keeffe and Hepworth, but most of all, contemporary artists like Jenny Saville, Harry Paul Ally and Yulia Bas.
Q: What is the best advice you’ve received?
A: “Turn your pain into purpose.”
Q: What does exhibiting at Spectrum Miami 2023 mean to you?
A: I had the privilege to exhibit at Spectrum Miami in 2021. It marked the ‘relaunch’ of my career -not long after my return to the US after living in India for 5 years and teaching art to children living in slums and brothels. This year I’m grateful to be able to return to Miami once again and I’m very excited. I believe my work has grown and I can’t wait to show 20 new pieces never exhibited before.