Marlene Steyn
b.1989, South Africa
b.1989, South Africa
BIOGRAPHY
Marlene Steyn was born in Stellenbosch and currently lives and works in Cape Town, South Africa. Steyn completed a BFA at Stellenbosch University and graduated in 2011. Thereafter, she attended the Royal College of Art in London and completed her MA in painting in 2014. She experiments with bright colours whilst combining both beautiful and eerie imagery in dream-like landscapes. Inspired by psychoanalytic theory, Steyn incorporates images from art history and popular culture to conjure uncanny motifs by means of repetition. She often references familiar objects, making use of unconventional arrangements to highlight unconscious and repressed impulses. Steyn is known to make use of the androgynous figure, fried egg and long, blonde braided strings of hair. Her work has been likened to that of the Dutch master, Hieronymus Bosch yet her historical references stretch wide as one can recognise Hokusai’s Great Wave in her painting, The Consequence of Waving (2016). Apart from painting, Steyn has ventured into producing sculptures, ceramic and bronze objects. The scale of her sculptures conveys a physical presence which permits the viewer to indulge in self-reflection. As in her paintings, she continues to play in the realm of unbounded experimentation with form and colour, producing thought-provoking sculptural works which speak of subconscious spontaneity.
SELECTED WORKS
— Available Works