About
Sylvia Schwenk is a Berlin-based multidisciplinary artist working across painting, ceramic sculpture, drawing, socially engaged performance art and film. Her current bodies of work are your thoughts become your world, an ongoing series of more than 280 abstract paintings exploring perception, rhythm and change and absurdity, an ongoing cross-medium project combining ceramic sculpture, painting, drawing and an illustrated book drawn from her experience as a Chartered Accountant attached to a Federal Government Taskforce.
Born in Mannheim, Sylvia grew up in Australia and moved to Berlin in 2017. Her practice is grounded in the close observation of everyday life, in the gestures, routines and patterns that shape how we live together. She looks at the world and then represents it differently, in ways that are simple, playful and quietly humorous. Her works invite people to pause, to think and to shift perspective, opening connections and possibilities that might otherwise remain unnoticed.
For more than two decades Sylvia has worked across media and scales, from public and institutional settings to the studio, always choosing the medium that best serves the idea. Moving between forms shapes her attention to context and composition and helps her develop visual languages that are both rigorous and open-ended.
In 2023, a serious injury to her arm and wrist brought her practice to a halt for nearly two years, during which she underwent four operations and extensive rehabilitation. Through the process of recovery, she started working with clay, an experience that led her to revisit and substantially expand absurdity, a project she had first begun a decade earlier.
Sylvia exhibits widely and participates in international artist residencies. Her artwork is held in public and private collections including Museum für Sepulkralkultur in Kassel, Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre in Sydney, Gold Coast City Art Gallery Australia and Stanford University in California USA. Sylvia received a PhD from Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney and studied at KISD in Cologne and the Universität der Künste in Berlin.
Selected solo exhibitions include Artereal Gallery, Sydney, oqbo project space, Berlin, dianne tanzer gallery + projects, Melbourne, Dynamo Expo, Enschede and Perron 1, Delden, NL. Selected group exhibitions include Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre, Sydney, Rutgers University, New Jersey and Lincoln Arts Project, Massachusetts. Some of her commissions of socially engaged performance art include the Royal Australian Navy, Kunstwerkstatt an der Turmstraße, Stadt Monheim am Rhein, Kultursekretariat NRW Gütersloh, the INTERREG – Grenzregionen gestalten Europa programme, Art Fairs Sydney and Melbourne and Art Month.
Sylvia’s artist residencies include Kunstwerkstatt an der Turmstraße, Monheim am Rhein, the Künstlerdorf Schöppingen, aadk Blanca, the Academy of the Arts, University of Tasmania, Mosman Art Gallery, Sydney, HMAS Penguin, Sydney and albb Saigon, Vietnam.
For collectors
Works across all mediums and scales are available. Individual works start from €700 unframed.
Enquire about a workFor galleries and curators
Exhibition proposals, studio visits and loans are welcome.
Discuss an exhibitionCV
Sylvia Schwenk’s CV is available as a PDF download