New Zealand born artist, Julia deVille, creates dazzling and dark artworks using her skills in animal taxidermy and knowledge of jewellery and silversmithing. deVille’s fascinating animal sculptures are both macabre and thought-provoking works – but retain a curious warmth about them. They are in fact not sinister, but rather joyful, reflected in the delicate and respectful processes she goes through in order to make them. Fascinated by notions of mortality, death and the celebration of life, deVille endeavours to capture a moment; “as a society we spend most of our time thinking about the past or projecting into the future. The only moment that actually holds any value is this moment. I use symbols of morality in my work as an anchor to the present, a reminder of the importance of life”.
As a staunch animal rights activist deVille uses her animal bodies as the core part of her artworks, bringing them ‘back to life’ by adorning them with jewels and re-positioning them within her Victoriana aesthetic. All the animals have died from natural causes, and go through painstaking processes of re-incarnation to become uniquely sentimental and adorned objects whose message can also be socio-political.
Last year, Julia completed a solo show of larger artworks, featuring a stillborn calf titled It’s a wonderful life. The calf was strung up as if in an abattoir, its throat cut and strings of pearls and diamonds, rather than blood, dripping into a milk bottle. Her latest and most adventurous project to date involves working on a two-metre-tall still-born giraffe in Australia.
To prove her dedication to her art form, deVille has donated her body to Germany’s renowned Institute for Plastination. After her death, it will be dissected, filled with a special polymer and preserved for exhibition.
deVille has exhibited all over the world in both solo and group shows, winning awards in 2012 for the City of Hobert Art Prize, 2012 Creation Grant from Arts Victoria, and a New Work Grant from the Australia Council. She a strong following of collectors all over the world, and continues to exhibit regularly in Australia. She has works in the Beason Collection at Hobart City Council, Hobart The Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), Tasmania , the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV), Melbourne, and other Private collections in Australia, New Zealand, Paris and China.
