Unsolved Histories Exhibition by Deborah Klein – Ballarat Heritage Festival

Deborah Klein’s iconic ‘rear view portraits’ allude to the countless women who have fallen through the cracks of history. Her latest solo exhibition marks the first time this body of paintings and works on paper, created over the last sox years, has been exhibited in Ballarat. A suite of diminutive watercolours reflects the artist’s continuing fascination with portrait miniatures and the intricately woven hair work associated with Victorian mourning and sentimental jewellery – key influences that continue through her larger, though still intimately-scaled paintings.

Other works pay homage to women’s domestic and decorative handcrafts, several of them incorporating design elements from vintage hand-made doilies inherited from the artist’s late aunt, Ballarat-born Eileen Elizabeth Klein.