Artist CV

(b 1973ZA. Lives and works in Cape Town)

Barbara Wildenboer’s trademark altered books function as narrative clues to her other artwork. Curiosity drives her practice, which explores a range of subjects, from the history of X-rays, and camera obscura to astronomy and physics. “I try to dig a little deeper into the mysterious nature of reality and our beliefs about it,” says Wildenboer. “While the role of science has been to demystify and decode the supernatural, recent forays into quantum physics and fields of reality that cannot be physically seen, continue to reveal strange phenomena, spooky actions and mysterious entanglements.”

2020

SUPER/NATURAL, Everard Read Gallery /CIRCA, Cape Town

Library of the  Infinitesimally Small and Unimaginably Large II, XVA Gallery, Dubai, UAE

Retrospective  exhibition - Online, Festival artist for the Klein Karoo Arts Festival, Oudshoorn  

2019

Folly, Everard Read Gallery, London 

2018

Eros / Thanatos, Everard Read Gallery, Johannesburg  

2017

The Invisible Gardener, Everard Read Gallery /CIRCA, Cape Town 

2016

Mythematics, Mcontemporary, Sydney, Australia  

2015

Something Rather Than Nothing, The Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong  

2014

The Lotus Eaters, The Reservoir Gallery, Oliewenhuis, Bloemfontein, William Humphreys Museum, Kimberley, North West University, Potchefstroom 

2013

Disjecta Membra, Amelia Johnson Contemporary, Hong Kong 

2012

Canaries in the Coalmine, Erdmann Contemporary, Cape Town and Aardklop,  Potchefstroom  

2011

Library of the Infinitesimally Small and Unimaginably Large, ErdmannContemporary, Cape Town 

2008

Present Absence/Absent Presence, ErdmannContemporary, Cape Town  

2004

Rites of Passage, Association of Visual Arts, Cape Town 

2017

Cut Up /Cut Out, travelling Museum Exhibition: Bellevue Arts Museum, Bellevue

Huntsville Museum of Art, Huntsville

Ellen Noël Art Museum, Odessa

Pensacola Museum of Art, Pensacola

Lamont Gallery, Exeter

Foosaner Art Museum, Melbourne

Woodson Art Museum, Wausau

Amarillo Museum of Art, Amarillo

Booknesses: South African Artists’ Books, FADA Gallery, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg 

2016

Surface and Subtext, Everard Read Gallery, Cape Town

This is Not a Book, The San Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose

Lush, SMAC Gallery, Stellenbosch

Map of the New Art, Imago Mundi, Luciano Benetton Collection, Isola di San Giorgio Maggiore, Venezia, Italy and New York 

2015

Ten years of Artists Books, A collection of artists’ books curated for the Brooklyn Public Library, New York

Homage, Everard Read, Cape Town

The Artist as Author, Klein Karoo Nasionale Kunstefees, Oudshoorn 

2014 

The Art of the Book, The Seager Gray Gallery, San Francisco 

2010

Matters Conceptually & Conceptual Matters (part I and II) Erdmann Contemporary, Cape Town 

2009

3d Riwaq Biennale, Birzeit, Palestine 

2008

Construct: Beyond the Documentary Photograph (travelling exhibition) Unisa Gallery, Pretoria, KZN Gallery, Durban, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Gallery, Port Elizabeth, Grahamstown Art Festival (Main show), Grahamstown, Goethe Institute, Johannesburg, South Africa

Print 08: Myth, Memory and the Archive, Bell-Roberts Gallery, Woodstock, South Africa 

2006

Unesco-Achberg, Jordan 

2009

Al Mahatta, Palestine 

2011

The Red De Residencias Artisticas Local, Columbia 

2013

Rimbun Dahan, Malaysia 

2016

L’Atelier Sur Seine, France 

2007

MA Fine Art (distinction), Michaelis School of Art, University of Cape Town 

1997

BA Visual Arts, UNISA, South Africa (online) 

1996

BA (Ed) with majors in English literature, Psychology and Pedagogics, University of Pretoria