Anita Laurence and Bill Young: A creative partnership

Image above:
Anita LAURENCE, artist
Bill YOUNG, printer
Karawinnaville 
linocut on 100% cotton paper
58 x 79 cm [image] 78 x 100 cm [sheet]

Image below:
Bill YOUNG, artist, printer
One Step
electro-etching/aquatint on paper from a brass plate
10 x15 cm [image] 32 x 26 cm [sheet]edition of 5

1st May – 28th June 2026

Pop-Up Benalla Art Gallery
75 Bridge Street East, Benalla

This exhibition of prints explores the creative partnership of significant local artists Anita Laurence and Bill Young which has spanned more than four decades. Anita is a painter and printmaker whose works are inspired by the strong connection she has with the landscapes she has called home – Mildura, Tasmania, Ireland – and for the last 35 years the King Valley in north east Victoria. Bill is a Master Printmaker specialising in large format intaglio and relief printing, and has worked with many leading Australian artists during his career. A printmaker doesn’t become a ‘master’ through academic studies but is designated the prefix by their peers in recognition of their skill level. Anita and Bill have explored printmaking throughout their careers – Anita’s focus has been on place while Bill’s has been on the process.

Printmaking is a magical process. It has its roots in the earliest production of printed material and shares its name with commercial / digital printing but is completely different. Each print starts with the artist drawing a design on a surface – lino, metal, stone, cardboard, plastic, nearly anything can be used – and each matrix adds its own characteristics to the final work. The image the artist creates has to be in reverse because the process of transferring it to the paper results in a mirror image of the original. This is just another element that the artist has to consider. Once the design is finalised, the plate is inked up and put through a press. Finally the artist or printmaker “pulls” the paper off the plate – an easy process with small sheets of paper but a highly skilled, physical undertaking with a large work. Each stage of the process has options that the artist can explore and the printmaker brings their own unique experience and knowledge to the collaboration. To make an ‘edition’ of a work, each of the prints must be identical (ideally). There should be no variations or differences between each work. Printmaking is a complex art that requires creativity, technical skill and dedication – characteristics that Anita and Bill have in abundance.

About the artists:

Anita Laurence is a painter and printmaker who earned her Degree in Fine Art Painting from Prahran College, Victoria (1981–1983) and later completed a Diploma of Education at the University of Melbourne in 1998. Over her career, Anita has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions across Australia, with recent showings at Hyphen Gallery Wodonga, 2022 and Wangaratta Art Gallery, 2023. Her work has been included in the Geelong Acquisitive Print Awards, the Chiltern Art Prize, and the Silk Cut Award exhibitions.

Anita is also active in arts education, leading workshops such as the Streets of Our Town Linocut Project in Mildura and the Mullinmur Billabong Linocut Project in Wangaratta. Recently she has received commissions from Beechworth Honey for merchandise designs and from the City of Whittlesea for a façade design on a new community building.

Her art is held in public collections including the Albury Cancer Centre, Albury Wodonga Hospitals, Federation Council Collection, Charles Sturt University, Mildura Arts Centre, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, National Gallery of Australia (Silk Cut Foundation Collection), Parliament House Art Collection, State Library of Victoria, the Northside Group St Leonards NSW, Wangaratta Art Gallery, and Wangaratta Dialysis Centre. Additionally, her work is part of private collections in Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore, Ireland, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Poland, the UK, and the USA.

anitalaurence.com.au

Bill Young has been interested in printmaking since his final years at high school when he was introduced to screen printing by teacher, and artist, Stephen Spurrier. A Diploma of Fine Art at Caulfield Institute of Technology followed, with printmaking as his focus, working mainly with zinc plate etched in nitric acid and printing intaglio. After art school, Bill purchased an etching press with fellow graduate Deborah Walker to continue practising as a printmaker and began printing for other artists to help offset the costs of studio facilities. Bill realised that he was suited to and enjoyed the challenge of printing for other artists and continued running a custom print workshop at various locations in Melbourne and, since 1999, the King Valley in north east Victoria.

Major collaborations with artists include Louis Kahan, John Spooner, Graeme Peebles, Geoffrey Ricardo, Nicholas Nedelkopoulos, Geoffrey Goldie, Michael Leunig, Petr Herel, Therese Shanley, and Anita Laurence. Bill considers it a privilege and rewarding position to have the trust of artists as a printer and facilitator of their work.

PUBLIC PROGRAMS

Monday 4 May: Anita Laurence ‘First Mondays’ artist talk

Saturday 23 May: Anita Laurence ‘Where We Live’ Art on Saturdays workshop

Saturday 20 June: Bill Young ‘Dry point etching’ Art on Saturdays workshop