Edwina Barton is a Sydney-based artist whose practice explores themes of grief, memory, disruption, fragmentation, and replication. Her work is deeply rooted in the early loss of her mother at the age of four, and the enduring presence of grief that shapes memory over time. Through her practice, Barton processes this personal history by working with found images, fragmenting and reassembling them to reflect the fractured nature of memory itself. 

 

“My practice is both artistic and personal, exploring the ongoing process and navigation of grief. I explore the memory of my mother, dimmed by both grief and time, and the way memories inevitably become fragmented and fade. There is a desperation to hold onto them as they disappear. I work with photographs because of their archival, found, and intimate qualities. A photograph is often the only way I can recognise my mother’s face; it is the only literal trace of her appearance and a record of moments together that can never be recreated.” 

 

Through printmaking and contemporary material practices, particularly with aluminium, Barton engages with grief in both material and conceptual ways. Influenced by Roland Barthes’ Mourning Diary and his reflections on photographs as vessels of mourning, her work investigates ideas of sectionalism, frottage, distortion, monochrome, materiality, and remembrance. 

 

Born in Sydney in 2004 and raised on a property outside Wellington, NSW, Barton now lives and studies at the National Art School. She continues to expand her practice and situate it within a contemporary context. Her work has been exhibited in multiple group shows, most recently ‘Mechanisms Unseen’ at the National Art School, and in 2024, she was awarded the Bettina McMahon Printmaking Prize. Barton’s works are held in private collections across Australia, including in Queensland, Melbourne, and Sydney.