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Bel Bare (b. 1972) is an Australian multidisciplinary artist, designer, and writer whose work critically explores the intersections of street culture, limerence, and spirituality. Over her career, Bel has developed a distinctive artistic voice that synthesises traditional symbolism with contemporary themes, creating a dialogue between historical and modern contexts.
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Artist Bio
Bel Bare (b. 1972, Australia) is a multidisciplinary artist, designer, and writer whose work critically explores the intersections of street culture, limerence, and spirituality. Over her career, Bel has developed a distinctive artistic voice that synthesises traditional symbolism with contemporary themes, creating a dialogue between historical and modern contexts.
Bel has studied mysticism for the last two decades, and it has deeply informed her artistic practice. In 2013, she embarked on a period of creative growth while living in the Laurentian Mountains near Montreal, Canada. Immersed in the natural landscape, she deepened her exploration of spiritual symbolism in modern life—a theme central to her work. Her interest in horticulture, particularly the folkloric use of herbs, informs her artistic practice, adding a dimension of natural mysticism to her creative expression.
From 2014 to 2017, her residence in Paris, France, further enriched her engagement with esoteric and occult themes, as the city’s cultural and intellectual milieu provided a fertile environment for refining her artistic and conceptual frameworks.
A nuanced use of symbolism and allegory characterises Bel’s work. She embraces ambiguity to challenge viewers to explore the complex relationships between the spiritual and material worlds. Her Maltese-Celtic heritage, with its symbolic traces of ancient traditions, religious iconography and symbolism, infused with Mediterranean mysticism, subtly informs her perspective, adding depth to her compositions. Her engagement with late 20th-century fringe surf culture also introduces a countercultural energy to her work.
In 2020, Bel authored the novel Breaking the Girl, a work in the ‘surf-gothic’ genre. This subgenre that Bel coined to describe her book, fuses Australian surf culture’s sun-drenched, rebellious ethos with gothic literature’s dark, atmospheric elements, with themes of mystery, existential angst, and the supernatural, creating a unique narrative and style. Additionally, in 2020, she designed the Seawitch Tarot deck under the pseudonym Willow Whiteraven.
Bel Bare’s art serves as a conduit between the ancient and the contemporary, encouraging viewers to reconnect with the mystical and symbolic aspects of life that are often overlooked in today’s secular world. Through her paintings, designs, and installations, she offers a space for reflection on the deeper meanings behind the symbols that permeate our everyday experiences.
