Davina Stephens is a New Zealand-born, internationally exhibiting artist whose practice has evolved over more than three decades across painting, printmaking, collage, textile processes, installation and mixed media.

Formed by her childhood in Bali and later experiences in India, New Zealand, the United States, Australia and across the Asia-Pacific, Stephens works from a position between cultures.

Her practice explores cultural memory, identity, migration, mythology and the continually shifting relationship between tradition and modernity.

Her work is deeply informed by observation, travel and cultural research. In recent years, her investigations have extended into the maritime cultures of the Indonesian archipelago and the wider Pacific, with particular interest in Austronesian languages, traditional vessels, cartography, migration and the historical movement of people, objects and ideas between islands.

Stephens' distinctive visual language is built through layering. Hand-carved woodblocks, rice paper, batik cap, maps, marine charts, stamps, collage, paint and found imagery are brought together to create richly textured works that move between abstraction, figuration and visual storytelling.

Her work has been exhibited extensively in Indonesia and internationally, including solo exhibitions in Indonesia, Australia, France, India, Thailand and Brazil, and presentations in New Zealand and Singapore.

Her exhibition history includes the Bali Biennale, Art Bali, Sydney Contemporary and Aotearoa Art Fair.

Critics and curators have consistently identified the synthesis of Eastern and Western visual traditions, cultural difference, layered construction and the relationship between traditional and contemporary worlds as central to her practice.

ARTISTIC PRACTICE

Stephens' practice is rooted in a lifelong engagement with place, movement and cultural exchange.

Rather than treating Bali or Indonesia as an exotic subject from the outside, she works from lived experience. Her early years in Bali provided an intimate understanding of its ceremonies, landscapes, visual culture and rapidly changing social environment. This became a foundation for a practice that has continually examined the meeting point between the traditional and the contemporary.

Her work has expanded from early paintings addressing Bali's changing cultural landscape into increasingly complex bodies of work incorporating mythology, spirituality, cartography, maritime history and cultural research.

Layering is fundamental to her methodology. Paint, print, collage and paper accumulate to form surfaces in which fragments of imagery, maps, symbols and stories coexist. The resulting works invite prolonged looking and reveal themselves gradually.

Bruce Carpenter has described this development as a movement toward greater complexity, symbolism and multidimensionality, with Stephens' works functioning as visual narratives in which Eastern and Western cultural references are brought into dialogue.

CURRENT RESEARCH

THE ARCHIPELAGO · VESSELS · VOYAGES · LANGUAGE

Stephens' recent practice is increasingly concerned with the cultural connections that exist across oceans rather than within contemporary political borders.

Her research into the Indonesian archipelago and Pacific has brought together:

• Austronesian languages

• maritime cultures

• traditional fishing vessels

• island communities

• cartography and marine charts

• migration and cultural exchange

• traditional objects and pottery

• oral histories and folklore

• flora and fauna

• cultural memory

• the relationship between land and sea

These investigations culminated in Vessels and Voyages, a major 2024 body of work incorporating painting, printmaking, video, sound installation and travel journals.

The work was informed by Stephens' sailing journeys through Eastern Indonesia and the Pacific and her encounters with island communities and their histories. Contemporary commentary around the exhibition emphasised the unusual depth of this engagement with maritime and Nusantara culture.

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SELECTED CAREER HIGHLIGHTS

35+ years of artistic practice and exhibition activity:

International exhibition history spanning Indonesia, Australia, France, India, Thailand, Brazil, New Zealand and Singapore.

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Solo exhibitions since 1992

• Bali Biennale 2005 — Space and Scape

• Art Bali 2019 — Speculative Memories

• Sydney Contemporary 2024 — Redbase Gallery

• Aotearoa Art Fair 2024 — Redbase Gallery

• Vessels and Voyages, Orbital Dago, Bandung, 2024

• Fashion Institute of Technology, New York — Textile Design / Studio Design

• Bill Blass Award, Fashion Institute of Technology, 1990

• Dean's List, Fashion Institute of Technology, 1987–1990

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SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2024 Vessels and Voyages,  Orbital Dago Gallery, Bandung, Indonesia

2011 From Bali with Love, Ganesha Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

2009 Floating Map,Thavibu Gallery, Bangkok, Thailand

2008 This Side of Paradise, Ganesha Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

2007 Days Future Passed,Michael Nagy Gallery, Sydney, Australia

2006 Free Transport Galerie Indoasia, São Paulo, Brazil

2001 National Highway NH-17,Vis-à-Vis Gallery, Delhi, India

1998 Manifold Changes,Ganesha Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

3D Carved Frame Paintings,Galerie Mostini, Paris, France

1996 Tribes on the Move,Seniwati Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

1994 This Way, Gallery 1A, Sydney, Australia

1992 One Way, Gucchaka Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

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SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2024

Vessels of Becoming
Threads of Life Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

Sydney Contemporary
Redbase Gallery, Sydney, Australia

Aotearoa Art Fair
Redbase Gallery, Auckland, New Zealand

2022

Laki Laki Jangan Menangis, Lano Art Project, Titik Dua, Mas, Bali

2019

Speculative Memories, Art Bali, Indonesia

2018

The Garden
Cush Cush Gallery / American Club, Singapore

2015

My Exquisite Corpse, Biasa Art Space, Bali, Indonesia

2014

A Collection of Works By Biasa Art Space, Bali, Indonesia

2010

Paper Power, Maha Art Gallery, Bali, Indonesia

2008

Collective International, Gallery 1A, Sydney, Australia

2005

Space and Scape,Bali Biennale, Bali, Indonesia

Vas Felix Estate Gallery,Perth, Australia

2002

Fontainhas Heritage Festival of the Arts,Panjim, Goa, India

1997

Mullumbimby Art Gallery, New South Wales, Australia

1996

Galerie du Rayon Vert  Wimereux, France

1995

The Bank Gallery Sydney, Australia

Gallery 1A Sydney, Australia

1994

Galerie du Rayon Vert Wimereux, France

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SELECTED BODIES OF WORK

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VESSELS AND VOYAGES

An interdisciplinary body of work examining the maritime cultures of the Indonesian archipelago and Pacific through painting, printmaking, sound, video and journals.

The work investigates vessels as carriers of people, language, memory and cultural exchange. Austronesian languages, traditional boats, maps, marine charts, pottery and island communities become recurring subjects.

The exhibition incorporated three interconnected themes: Austronesian Languages, The Journey and The Vessel.

MAPPING THE ARCHIPELAGO

A continuing exploration of maps, geography, movement and cultural memory.

Marine charts and cartographic fragments become both literal and metaphorical structures within Stephens' compositions, connecting individual stories with larger histories of migration and exchange. 

THIS SIDE OF PARADISE

A body of work examining Bali through mythology, spirituality, cultural change and the tension between the ancient and contemporary.

Bruce Carpenter's critical text identifies the increasing complexity of Stephens' work during this period and its synthesis of mythology, symbolism, Eastern and Western cultures and layered construction.

DAYS FUTURE PASSED

A mixed-media body of work addressing Bali's changing relationship with modernity, tradition and the natural environment.

The Jakarta Post highlighted the combination of painting, collage and woodcut printing and Stephens' ability to bring together Eastern and Western visual languages.

FLOATING MAP

A significant stage in Stephens' continuing exploration of cultural identity, geography and difference.

Afrizal Malna's accompanying text describes Stephens' practice as moving between cultures and examining how traditional and contemporary structures can coexist rather than being understood as opposing forces.

MATERIALS & TECHNIQUES

Painting
Oil · Acrylic · Watercolour · Pastel

Printmaking
Hand-carved woodblocks · Linocut · Monoprint · Textile printing · Batik cap

Mixed Media
Rice paper · Canvas · Collage · Maps · Marine charts · Found imagery · Stamps

Expanded Practice
Video · Sound · Installation · Artist journals

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Stephens' layering process combines print, paint and collage to create multidimensional surfaces. Her use of carved woodblocks and rice paper is particularly connected to her textile and printmaking background

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EDUCATION

Fashion Institute of Technology

New York, USA Associate Degree — Textile Design / Studio Design, 1990 Major: Textile Design and Studio Design, Screen Printing

Woodstock International School India
1985–1987

A Level Certificate — English Literature and Art
O Level Certificate — English Literature and Art

AWARDS & RECOGNITION

Bill Blass Award,Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, 1990

Dean's List,Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, 1987–1990

Fine Art Award,American Embassy School, New Delhi, 1986

SELECTED PRESS & CRITICAL WRITING

Richard Horstman

“An Invitation to Dream: The Art of Davina Stephens”
NOW! Jakarta, 2024

Horstman writes about Stephens' investigation of remote islands, traditional cultures and maritime communities and describes her practice as distinguishing oceanic traditions at a time of rapid cultural change.

Afrizal Malna

“Floating Map”

Malna examines Stephens' intercultural practice, her use of print and paint, and her exploration of the relationship between traditional and contemporary cultural structures. He positions her work as a response to globalisation and cultural difference.

Bruce Carpenter

“This Side of Paradise”

Carpenter describes the increasing complexity of Stephens' paintings, their symbolic and spiritual dimensions, and her use of layered construction to create multidimensional visual narratives.

Michelle Champaka

“Raising Awareness of Marine Life”
The Jakarta Post, 2007

Champaka discusses Stephens' mixed-media practice, her combination of woodcut, acrylic and collage, and her engagement with Balinese ritual and marine life.

Katie Truman

“From Bali with Love”

A profile of Stephens' development from her early Bali paintings through increasingly complex work addressing cultural transformation, spirituality and the changing relationship between Bali and the wider world.

Remko Tanis

“Meet Davina Stephens”
Indonesia Expat

An extended interview discussing Stephens' development from textile and carved-frame paintings toward woodblock printing, cartography and increasingly research-driven work.

Woodstock School

“Alumni Spotlight – Davina Stephens ’87”

An extended interview and profile examining Stephens' development as an artist, her independent career and her research into Austronesian migration, language and cultural histories.

Early Profile

“A Young Painter Records Changing Times”

An early profile/interview documenting Stephens' formative relationship with Bali and the emergence of her painting practice as a response to the changing cultural landscape.

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ARTIST'S STATEMENT

BETWEEN WORLDS

My work grows from a lifelong relationship with places, cultures and the spaces between them.

I was born in New Zealand and spent formative years in Bali and India before studying textile design and screen printing in New York. These experiences gave me an instinctive understanding of cultural difference, but also of the connections that exist beneath it.

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I am interested in the way cultures evolve, overlap and remember themselves. Bali has been a constant reference point, not as an exotic landscape but as a lived experience — a place of ceremony, mythology, nature, colour and extraordinary visual language that has itself undergone enormous transformation.

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My practice has developed through painting, printmaking, textiles, collage and mixed media. I build images through layers, combining hand-carved woodblocks, rice paper, batik, maps, marine charts, paint and found imagery. Each layer carries a fragment of information — a memory, a place, a story, a symbol — while the completed work becomes something larger than its individual parts.

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In recent years my curiosity has taken me further into the Indonesian archipelago and Pacific. Through travel and research I have become fascinated by the ancient connections between island communities: their languages, vessels, migrations, objects and stories.

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The ocean is not a boundary in this work. It is a connector.

My aim is to create images that invite imagination and encourage us to look beyond the obvious — to discover the histories, relationships and possibilities hidden within the layers.​​​​