Cher Van Schouwen

For Cher van Schouwen, her home in an old hotel is a studio, a gallery and a classroom, as well as a place to live life to the full with her family and friends.
The western suburbs are known for their historic charm, but no home is quite like that of local artist Cher van Schouwen, who lives with her family in part of what used to be a well-known watering hole.

“I love the sense of community that living in a section of the old Mosman Park Hotel provides,” Cher says. “The ‘bones’ of the old hotel have been beautifully retained, and the finishings when we moved in were brand new and tastefully chosen.” With her artistic nature, it is no wonder that Cher has an eclectic mix of recycled objects, hard-to-find pieces and inherited items that, she explains, create a fresh take on traditional design.

“Through family and travel we have collected pieces from different eras, reflecting their owners’ lives and passions,” she says. “I want our home to refresh their story with warmth, personality and sophistication.”

The home, which is also used as Cher’s studio, has been painted in neutral and soft colours to allow her artworks and statement furniture pieces to stand out. “I put up new paintings at different stages of completion to live with while working on them and evolving them into special moments for another person’ home.” Cher says. “We enjoy a mix of antique furnishings, collectables and sentimental treasures form all over the world.”

“I love pre-loved vintage upholstery, applique, natural fibres and exciting, but no overwhelming, colour that energises our home in a beautiful ways.” “Our fleur-de-lis dining table and chairs that we inherited from my mother-in-law takes centrestage. It reminds me of long, happy family luncheons once enjoyed on their farm and it speaks of travel, European heritage and cultural identity.”

One of Cher’s favourite features in the home is the spiral staircase, which leads out from the garden to a 20 x 10m black and white tiled balcony, lined by the tops of her neighbour’s poplar trees. “I now use that balcony areas as my studio and for my painting classes and private exhibitions, so I get to enjoy it every day, and my students just love it too,“ she says
Cher explains that her home, shared with husband Adrian and two children, Taigh and Emma Rose, I definitely about family and love.

“It’s a creative space to live life, plus a gallery for my works, a studio and classroom for my art practice, and a space where we can bring people around us to celebrate friendships and enjoy a wonderful life,” she says.
“I am really not about current trends. Style to me is a personal thing and something that evolves through life experiences.”
“I draw from those different experiences and various styles and eras through time to make a home that is personal, comfortable, joyous and really reflects me and my family and our loves and passions.”

Alyesha Anderson
myStyle, Sunday Times, September 30 – October 6, 2012

Mosman Park artist and art teacher Cher van Schouwen is constantly inspired by the vibrancy of life, and of human beings in particular.
“My paintings have a sense of fun,” she said. I don’t want to be a painter who depicts morbid things.”
It’s no surprise then that Cher’s debut solo collection, to be shown at The Breathing Colours Gallery in Balmain, Sydney, with a preview exhibition at Nell’s Emporium in Mosman Park, is inspired by all things spring-time.

Paintings in the collection range from big, textural florals bursting with colour to more tonal landscapes and portraits with the focus on composition, subject and light.
Two such paintings are a set of portraits of former Olympic Waterpolo player Guy Newman, who coincidentally grew up in Balmain, where the collection is being shown.

Cher was inspired to paint Guy when she came across photos of him taken in 1992.
She contacted him to ask his permission, and was delighted when he agreed to the portraits and to attend the exhibition in September, and speak at the opening.

She said the portraits of Guy portrayed a combination of masculinity and fragility, that evoked varying emotions, depending on their interpretation.
“That’s a comment around all of my pieces; that they make you think,” Cher said.
Cher’s Breathing Colours collection has a special preview at Nell’s Emporium, 15 Glyde Street, Mosman Park, on August 21, from 6 o 8.30pm. It opens in September in Sydney.

The Post, 21 July 2012
Photo By: Paul McGovern

Mosman Park artist Cher van Schouwen has joined a bank to raise money for charity.

Cher hung a painting at the Cottesloe Westpac branch this week – Peonie and Chair is acrylic on linen and costs $3600.

“At any exhibition I like to help charity, so when Westpac asked if I’d be interested in having a painting here I thought it was a wonderful idea,” Cher said.

Branch manager Darren Curtis said the bank supported several charities, including the surf life saving rescue helicopter.

“We’re also supporting the YMCA’s Big Brother Big Sister initiative,” Darren said.

“It’s a youth mentoring program run by YMCA Perth that helps disadvantaged young people aged between seven and 17.”

Cher, whose art is inspired by photography, was an interior designer before she became an artist.

Among her clients is the Duke of Edinburgh. More Cher creations will be on the walls and for sale at the bank’s Claremont, Nedlands and University branches.

(Post Newspaper November 2012)

Rooms full of beautiful things awaited guests on Thursday evening as they walked through the cottage doors of the North Fremantle lifestyle concept store Blu Peter. Sipping on South African red wine, visitors to the official opening of the contemporary, soulful shop with a heavy textured and African influence nibbled no bites by Pink Zulu while admiring the wares sourced by store owner Adri-Ann Brown.

Born in Zululand in 1975, South African artist Cher now resides in Perth, Western Australia.

After her first sold-out exhibition in 1992, Cher has passionately invested in art both professionally and academically. She works closely from selected photography, including her own and those of accredited others. Her instinctual sense for beauty continues to capture hearts throughout the world, coupled with canvases which create personal moments that change and refresh with light and mood.

Cher’s canvases are prepared with sane and splashed colour. This creates a play on shadow and texture which drives her creative focus resulting in powerful, robust art pieces. There are definite elements of abstraction and detail in her style, but she is ultimately a representational painter.

The artist’s paintings are collected by some of the world’s top art aficionados and included in their collections. Her wondermentand intrigue with all things beautiful has seen her paintings grace resorts, restaurants and private gallery’s throughout Europe, the United States, South Aftrica and Australia.

Nominated as Artist of the Year by Fairlady Magazine in 2002, Cher continues to carve out a niche in the art industry because of her unique textural and colourblotch aestehetic.

CHER’s paintings are frequently recognized for their colossal impact, romance and righteous celebration of both subject and life.

Art lovers are in for a treat with the opening of Cher van Schouwen’s lively exhibition of works in oil on canvas from Friday. Her work vibrates with a refreshing joie de vivre as she explores self-contours, colours, space and balance in thick busy layers of colour and its evident that she paints for the pure love of art.
This self-trained  artist has been painting professionally for the last two and a half years and her work captured the attention of art-dealer Joshua Rossouw in 1998.
This has resulted in more and more art lovers being introduced to Rossouw’s “new discovery”. Her work is eagerly being added to collections all over the world and has already been commissioned by international art collectors.
Since leaving Zululand where she was born in 1975, Cher studied journalism at Rhodes University and completed an interior diploma course in Cape Town before marrying a Stanford farmer. On the farm, surrounded by breathtaking beauty of the fynbos, her creative energy knew no bounds and she started painting professionally, allowing her vivacious personality to spill onto the canvases in an explosion of patent enjoyment. It is these works that will be on exhibition at Gallery No 10 Harbour Road. The exhibition will be open daily from 9.30 – 5.00 until 1 February and should not be missed by serious art lovers.

Fairlady’s dream team for 2002 Cher van Schouwen Hermanus artist making big impressions locally and internationally