PAOLA KING-BORRERO

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Paola's work is greatly influenced by her international background and cultural sensitivities. She was born in Colombia, raised in New Zealand, educated in the United States and spent half her life in Greece.

Ever since she can remember, Paola has been collecting objects and images, resulting in a vast collection from over thirty years. As an artist, she is attracted to her collection for its symbolism, textures or its purely aesthetic properties.

Many of these materials are found in nature, such as hair, beehives, teeth and bones. By meshing them with everyday objects such as boxes, dilapidated frames and using ephemeral matter, Paola creates an artwork. Her subject matter consists of birth, death, the body, pain, the sublime and also contemporary ideas interspersed with nostalgia.

Juxtapositions between the beautiful and the ugly, serenity and violence, optimism versus pessimism, synthetic against the natural, protection and containment, keeping treasures and secrets, are translated into a biting edge beauty intermingled with a hint of the macabre.