Artist's Statement
In 1910 my Russian and Polish grandparents fled Europe and settled in New York. Nearly a century later, I was an American on vacation in Italy, fell in love with a Londoner, and moved to England to marry him.
In this exhibition, the dogs adrift on the River Thames recall for me my migrating ancestors and my own journey back across the ocean to make a new home in England. This led me to imagine other journeys, such as Darwin’s voyages which led him to the Theory of Evolution as depicted in my “Darwin’s Creatures” series. Other etchings depict the search for the sublime, in nature, in dance, in love.
I print many etchings using handmade Japanese, Tibetan, or Indian papers, which have been tinted with vegetable colours. Some have silk threads, or bits of bark and leaf embedded in the paper. This delicate paper is bonded to a heavier rag paper during the printing, which gives it strength.
Aimee Birnbaum was born in New York City. She trained at the Boston Museum School of Fine Art before coming to live in London in 1984.
She is an Elected Member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours and is also listed in the 2012 edition of Who’s Who in Art.
Co-founder of MirabilisART she exhibits with the Slovene artist Nina Zelenko in Slovenia, Croatia and the U.K. Recent exhibitions in summer 2012 include the solo exhibition Time and the River Thames at the Brunel Museum, London; Art in Action, Waterperry, Oxford and London Views, the Olympic Exhibition at the Mall Galleries, London.
Awards and prizes:
The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers prize
The June Stokes-Roberts Bursary in Painting in Water Colours
National Print Exhibition, Mall Galleries, Kew Studio Prize
Royal Watercolour Society, Bankside Gallery
St. Cuthbert’s Mill Award, C21 Exhibition St. Cuthbert’s Mill Award,
Ben Uri Gallery Printmaking Prize