After having lived in 4 different countries (and collected 3 citizenships along the way), Emese (“Mesh”) now considers Australia home. She lives and works on Dharug land. She has had a deep passion for art and drawing from a young age: at age 14 she was copying the works of Italian, Dutch and Flemish master painters (and drawing portraits of Kurt Cobain), and her favourite books were The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone and The Story of Art by Ernst Gombrich. Growing up, she couldn’t picture herself doing anything else other than art, but then due to some unfortunate life events – such as getting rejected (twice) by the Hungarian University of Fine Arts and battling debilitating chronic pain for 14 long years – she has had to embark on a career in translation, localisation and interpreting instead. 

But the passion never died – in fact, it is now stronger than ever. Mesh has shown her work in Canada, Hungary, and now Australia as well (where she has been a finalist in the Stanthorpe Art Prize and the Lethbridge Small Scale Art Award). Her favourite medium is the humble graphite pencil (though sometimes she dabbles in watercolour, coloured pencil and various other media), and the genre dearest to her heart is portraiture. 

Her drawings are her silent, introverted reactions to (as well as a refuge from) the unfathomable and maddening inhumanity, inequality and cruelty of the wider world. She sees art (and music in particular) as the only antidote to the madness of the world. She firmly believes music has magical healing powers and musicians are magicians: which is why musicians — with or without their instruments — often feature as central subjects in her drawings. 

Recently she has also started creating affectionate portraits of animals that capture their gentle innocence. Because animal welfare is an issue that’s very close to her heart, her future plans include partnering with animal charities and rescue organisations to help raise funds for animals through the use of her artwork.