Annette Galstaun paints scenes that are both familiar and otherworldly, like a nostalgic memory or a lingering dream. Her art world is a place where mermaids, birdlife and movie characters happily coexist in pattern and colour.

Using her abstracted technique, Annette creates angelic and regal beings with elaborate costumes and embellished surroundings. Her characters gaze at you with pensive expressions;  they are surreal, beautifully distorted and completely unique.  Annette likes to express her spirituality in her works, often depicting religious and mystical subject matter to consider what is beyond the immediate. She also likes to depict scenes from classic fairytales, Disney films and popular culture.  

Annette works with gouache, acrylic and pencil mediums, and also sews soft sculptures and creates paper dolls of her characters. 

In 2022 Annette unveiled Magical Putt Putt,  a newly commissioned installation for Cement Fondu’s main gallery space. Her exhibition features a series of artist-designed mini-golf sculptures, which visitors are encouraged to communally engage with. With each sculpture painted with a celestial spirit or icon, the work blends novelty with the profound. Magical Putt Putt was also exhibited at the University of New South Wales for Trophy Dreams,  a Studio A collaborative exhibition.   

2018 saw Annette collaborate with The Social Outfit for their King Botanic Spring/Summer 2018-2019 collection. The ‘Lioness Print’ combined two of the artist's paintings, Untitled (Lion and Lioness) and Under The Palm Trees. Her lion artwork was inspired by Disney’s The Lion King and Annette hoped that her audiences would find it “joyous and funny”. 

Annette has exhibited in a number of important Studio A group shows (Suburbia, Cement Fondu, 2018;  home, Sub Base Platypus, 2019; Project 2060: Homeward Bound, Coal Loader Waverton, 2021; Incognito Art Show, 2022). She contributed to collaborative Studio A mural works, Bird Life Jungle Disco at UTS in 2019 and Love owls and mermaids singing in the rainbow pop at the Art Gallery of NSW in 2020. In 2020 she was also shortlisted for the Liberty Speciality Markets Art Awards.

Words by Anna McKey