Effie Pryer: Closet Drama
A closet drama is a play intended to be experienced privately by the reader and never performed. Although satisfying to indulge, sometimes our own elaborate dramas are best kept confined to the imagination by a healthy sense of perspective. Inspired by icon paintings which contrast sumptuous materials with unimaginable suffering, these small paintings stage trivial woes with the tragedy of undeserved martyrdom.
Effie Pryer is a Tasmanian artist living in Hobart, working primarily as a portrait and figurative painter in oils. Her professional experience as a paintings conservator informs her traditional technique, as well as using the unique qualities of Tasmanian timber panels both as support and an integral part of the finished artwork. The paintings often dislocate well-known classical narratives by reproducing them in awkward, contemporary contexts, questioning whether we can sometimes take ourselves and art a little too seriously. Effie has been a finalist in national portrait and figurative painting prizes and undertaken recent portrait commissions for the University of Tasmania and Parliament of Tasmania.