Nurturing a modern art
ARTIST Bill (Chaim) Meyer has continued his journey of visual exploration with a new exhibition of digitally altered abstract prints at the Castlemaine Art Gallery.
The exhibition, Nurturing the Place, features 50 new works. It is the latest in his HaMakom series that started with A Special Place exhibition at the Jewish Museum of Australia in 2006 and continued with Significant Journeys – which explored the concept of religious, spiritual, artistic and personal journeys – at JMA in early 2013.
“This is my first exhibition in a long time that is outside the Jewish Museum, which is very exciting,” he says. “All the works are specially for this exhibition.”
Castlemaine, a former gold mining town, is 120 kilometres north-west of Melbourne.
Meyer uses a variety of photographic and artistic techniques with computer software and programs to produce his distinctive prints, many of which have Hebrew and Yiddish titles.
“In Nurturing the Place, I look at the idea of interaction with the environment. I like to explore spiritual issues through my work.”
Meyer, 72, studied art history and language at Melbourne University, then studied at the National Gallery Art School and the Victorian College of the Arts before completing his formal art training at the Royal College of Art in London.
He attended New York’s YIVO Institute, as well as yeshivahs, and has been a frequent visitor to Israel, including extended periods during the 1980s and 1990s as a resident at the Mishkenot Sha’ananim artists’ studios in Jerusalem.
As a master print-maker, Meyer established a fine-art studio in London during the 1970s, when he also worked with the World Union of Jewish Students. He has worked with major Australian artists at Port Jackson Press in Melbourne, publishing more than 400 editions of etchings, screen prints and lithographs.
For more than 30 years Meyer has lived on a 40-hectare bushland property near Daylesford, north-west of Melbourne.
Meyer, who is Orthodox, travels to Melbourne regularly to attend shul on Shabbat and yom tovs, and also spends part of each year in Israel.
“I love living in the bush and find it perfect to do my art,” he says.
The Nurturing the Place exhibition is at Castlemaine Art Gallery, 14 Lyttleton Street, Castlemaine until December 14. The gallery is open from Monday to Sunday (10am to 5pm). Enquiries: www.castlemainegallery.com.
REPORT by Danny Gocs
PHOTO of Bill Meyer’s art in his Nurturing the Place exhibition at the Castlemaine Art Gallery.
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