A dozen portraits of a dozen women, each coupled with their unique story, are hanging in a gallery at the Yukon Arts Centre.
Maeva Esteva, has spent roughly five years working on a collection of portraits of women who inspire. The portraits are rendered in pastel on black paper and they share common features including shadows of vegetation on the women’s faces and in some cases, they include pops of colour on their hair, eyes, clothing or jewelry.
Esteva says the shadows of the plants represents both women’s sensitivity and connection to nature as well as the obstacles they face in life.
“I wanted to use one colour per drawing for some of the colour I couldn’t. Otherwise, yeah, you can see like each drawing have like just one specific colour. It depends of kind of the character of the person,” Esteva said regarding the parts of the drawings that break from the otherwise monochrome style.
The subjects of the drawings include a Tahitian dancer, First Nations Elders, prominent Yukon professionals working in support of women and a women’s rights advocate from Afghanistan.
Esteva personally knows or contacted all the women involved and either shot her own reference photographs, or worked from professional photos. Some are women she met on various sailboat trips including to Greenland and in the South Pacific.
The 12 drawings are being shown at the Yukon Arts Centre in an exhibit called “all women.” It opened on March 6 and runs until March 28.
Esteva will be selling prints of the drawings with women’s associations in Whitehorse, the Victoria Faulkner Women’s Centre and Yukon Aboriginal Women’s Council as well as an organization supporting women and girls in Afghanistan. Sales are being conducted via Esteva’s website www.maevaestevaart.com
She said she may add to the collection of drawings in this theme and style in the future.
Contact Jim Elliot at jim.elliot@yukon-news.com
