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Karlien de Villiers. Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe - detail. 2019. Watercolour, ink and gouache on paper. 100 x 70 cm.
About
Karlien de Villiers was born in Cape Town, South Africa in 1975. She studied Graphic Design and Illustration at Stellenbosch University and started her career as a graphic designer at Orange Juice Design Studio at advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather, Cape Town. In 2006
she received an MA in Information Design from Pretoria University. After completing her Master's degree, she was appointed as a lecturer in Illustration and Design at Stellenbosch University from 2006 to 2017. De Villiers currently lectures in Visual Communication Design and Illustration, and she is the coordinator of the postgraduate Honours Illustration course at the Department of Visual Arts, SU.
Karlien de Villiers. Burnt by the Sun. 2016. Watercolour, ink and gouache on paper.
Dimensions: 31 x 41 cm.
Karlien de Villiers. The Knowing Little Grin. 2014. Watercolour, ink and gouache
on paper. Dimensions: 31 x 41 cm.
Karlien de Villiers began making art and comics as an undergraduate student at Stellenbosch University, during the final decades of apartheid and while living through the historical transformation from minority rule to a constitutional democracy in South Africa in the mid to late 1990s. She later created a graphic novel entitled Ma Mère était une très belle femme (My Mother was a beautiful woman), that was published internationally in German, French, Italian and Spanish.
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Throughout her career, her art has retained an element of the dark, comical, and narrative. Besides comic-art, she works in a mode of portrait illustration across various mediums, including mixed media on paper, watercolour, acrylics, sculpture, and printmaking. Each medium imparts its own distinctive features but the cast of naively-rendered figures remains constant, exerting their tragicomic pathos and a prevailing sense of doom.
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De Villiers' work has been published and featured in Le Monde (FR), Internazionale (IT), Bodoï (FR), Canal BD (FR), Neue Zürcher Zeitung (CH), Tages-Anzeiger (CH), Süddeutsche Zeitung (DE), Der Tagesspiegel (DE), Between 10and5 (ZA), Bitterkomix (ZA), i-Jusi Magazine (ZA), Comic Art Africa (ZA), Artthrob (ZA), Bookdash (ZA), Art South Africa (ZA), Mail & Guardian (ZA), Business Day (ZA), VISI Magazine (ZA), ELLE Decor (ZA) and The Sunday Times (ZA).
Karlien de Villiers. Ma Mère était une très belle femme . 2006. Graphic novel French version.
Karlien de Villiers. Les Femmes Sauvages . 2013-2017. New graphic novel: French version - work in progress.