Patricia Piccinini was born in 1965 in Freetown, Sierra Leone. She is an Australian artist and hyperrealist sculptor. Her art work came to prominence in Australia in the late 1990s. In 2003 she was selected as the artist to represent Australia at the Venice Biennale. Patricia Piccinini looks at the current changes in technology in our world such as genetic engineering and virtual reality. She makes artworks about these subjects using the latest media materials and technology. Patricia Piccinini specializes in creating strange super real life forms. Her ongoing interest in with the possibilities of biotechnology can be seen in many of her works where she combines the mechanical, man made and engineered with the natural and organic. She will often make life size sculptures molded from silicone, acrylic and other materials but also works digitally, in the form of film, photography or multimedia installations.
