Our 2025 Art Superstar: Odessa!
Hello there!
Oh we are SO EXCITED to introduce you to our 2025 JUMBLED Art Superstar - Odessa Mahoney-de Vries! Taking over the baton from Claudio Kirac, it was actually so lovely to meet Odessa in person at the Brisbane Affordable Art Fair and we cannot wait see her grow over this coming year!
GET TO KNOW ODESSA!
How do you describe your art practice?
It’s messy, playful, and intuitive. I like to discover something new in every painting I make, if it looks too familiar to me I will just paint over it or keep pushing the paint around. It’s very process based and I like to work in many layers letting it dry overnight. With both the painting and sculptures I just start making marks or forms and see where it leads me, I respond in the moment quickly and often decisively. This can lead to sections being wiped away, subtracted, or bold and protruding. I think making for me needs to be approached with a kind of openness to experiment and take risks to get to the unknown.
What medium did you start with? How does it differ from your work now?
I started with acrylics and now I mostly use oil paint and oil sticks as well as clay for sculpting. Acrylic was always more convenient but since renting my own studio I can be an absolute mess and have 10 paintings on the go. The colours, textures and slow drying time opened up so many more possibilities.
What was your childhood like?
I had an art table/board set up for me all the time and mum would take me to GOMA. When I was about 9 I started doing art classes every weekend where I enjoyed learning to paint portraits, landscapes, wildlife, and still life’s. When I was in primary school we made frog head masks for a performance, we were instructed to "use two colours and do not mix them". I could not understand why and decided to use all the colours… turning my mask into a toad. I still paint like that constantly just doing things and seeing what happens, it’s part of the process.
What is a typical day for you?
Every day is different really but the days I'm in the studio I usually start at 11am and walk around from one task to the next with tea breaks in between until about 7pm. I have a physical diary to plan each week and I just scribble all over it as things change. It's called ‘Perpetual Disappointments Diary’ it’s hilarious. Every week it says something depressing like “The darkest part of night is just before the dawn of another pointless day”.
Where do you gather inspiration from?
I think I am inspired by my life experiences and exploring/traveling but more so by the material and the process that I enjoy so much. Once I start making my hands and body engage, it’s kind of a break from my brain. I’m just focusing on the task at hand, nothing else really matters in the moment.
What do you listen to while you work? Podcasts or music?
I have a music playlist that helps me get into the mood of painting. It just plays all day super loud. I think I was in the top 96% of listeners on Spotify because it just plays in the background while I work.
When you're not creating, what do you like to do?
Most of my time I spend creating but I try to have some balance. I like to go to gigs, galleries, swim at the beach, walk to waterfalls, sing karaoke, do boxercise, and I’ve recently started playing badminton with my mum just for fun. I think it's important to be silly and have a laugh amongst all the art business tasks.
If you weren't an artist, what would you be?
To supplement my art practice over the last 10 years I have done a range of part time and casual jobs including being a Lolly pop lady, administrator, support worker, relief teacher, and waitress. But I did those jobs to keep making art, while I’m grateful to have experienced so much in those roles, I don't have the same love, commitment, and curiosity for them as I do with painting and making sculptures.
What does the future look like?
I think the future looks the same as it is now but with bigger projects and opportunities over a lifetime of making and exploring.
