Three Artists – One Place
An Exhibition by Anne Grant, Johanna de Roder & Paula Koert-Bain
Anne, Johanna, and Paula are friends in Smiths Lake, NSW. Each works in a different medium, but all are inspired by the same environment—the lake, the ocean and surrounding coastal landscape.
Anne’s practice is grounded in drawing and technical composition. Influenced by Bauhaus and Constructivist principles, her work explores balance, rhythm, and the structures that shape how Anne perceives place.
Johanna is a ceramic artist whose hand-built vessels and sculptural pieces reflect the textures and vitality with the ecology. Her ceramics and printmaking capture the essence of marine life, vegetation and coastal environments in both functional and expressive ways.
Paula creates textile works using eco-dyed silk, linen and embroidery. Relying on natural pigments and fibres, she reinterprets coastal landscapes with layered colour and delicate stitching, capturing the material essence and atmosphere of the region.
Together, these artists present three distinct yet connected perspectives of the landscape in which they live. Their works—geometric, organic, embroidered, and sculptural – demonstrate how one place can be experienced and reimagined through different materials and approaches. This exhibition is about creative practice, friendship, and a shared inspiration of living within a coastal community.
Artist Statements
Anne Grant is a visual artist who draws inspiration from the observation of coastal environments and her practice is informed by her background in technical drawing. She completed her Bachelor of Creative Practice – Visual Art at TAFE NSW in 2024 and works across drawing, printmaking, painting, and sculpture. Emulating the compositional clarity of the Bauhaus and Constructivist movements, her recent work extends ongoing investigations into map-making, spatial rhythm, and balance. Exploring the premise that subtle shifts within an environment can alter the whole, Anne uses precision and restrained palettes to consider perception, interconnection, and the dynamic relationships that define place.
Johanna de Roder is a ceramic artist and printmaker inspired by the coastal environment of Smiths Lake, NSW. Her hand-built vessels, sculptural pieces, and prints reflect the textures, colours, and vitality of marine life, vegetation, and shoreline landscapes. Working from her own photography and sketches, Johanna develops designs that move between two-dimensional prints and three-dimensional ceramic forms. Colour is central to her practice, bringing energy and joy to her interpretations of nature that celebrate her deep connection to place. With a background in cartography and environmental science, Johanna combines precision with creative exploration, offering tactile, expressive works that encourage viewers to touch the surfaces and engage.
Paula Koert-Bain’s textile art explores the interplay between natural and constructed landscapes, expressed through fabric, texture, and stitch. With a background in technical drafting, European fashion studies, and decades of experience as a tailor, seamstress, and designer, she fuses technical precision with creative interpretation. Her works often begin with walks, drives, or observations in nature, translated into sketches, photography, and fabric collages. Using linens, cottons, silks, and upholstery textiles, she treats fabric not as a backdrop but as an integral textural element. Stitching functions like brushstrokes in painting, adding warmth, depth, and narrative rather than simply joining materials. Techniques such as staining, dyeing, and layering enhance the tactile quality, while depictions of flora and fauna provide context and scale. Paula’s intuitive hand-stitching process invites close inspection, encouraging viewers to touch and engage with the delicate contrasts of hard and soft materials, celebrating landscapes through constructed and deconstructed forms.