Biography
Anna Korver has dual nationalities - New Zealand and Benin. She currently divides her time at home and overseas. She has been a full time professional sculptor since completed a BFA in sculpture from the University of Canterbury in 2003. Korver works nationally and internationally on exhibition work and private and public commissions. She has been selected in the Wallace Awards twice and invited to exhibit work in many large scale outdoor sculpture exhibitions including Brick Bay Sculpture Trail and Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden. Korver has attended more than 80 national and international sculpture symposiums, and has installed sculpture all over the world, including Egypt, Columbia, Qatar, Serbia and Italy.
Korver’s works combine a balance of contemporary and traditional sculpting processes and are feminine in their identity and perspective, inviting intimacy and personal connection. The forms are minimalist and strive to reflect the inner self or feeling onto the outer surface. Her work previously projected concepts from an internal place, but currently reflect more about the current situation or experience both personally and globally. The fundamental concepts generally revolve around the defence and protection of women but often from a subtle, gentle place. They question and challenge traditional feminine roles, offering a different kind of strength where the masculine and feminine sides are in balance and delicate, fragility is recognised instead of seen as a weakness, reflecting on feminism’s advocacy for equality for both genders.
During the global pandemic, Korver was confined firstly in her home country of New Zealand but later moved to her new home of Benin. The stark contrasts, different challenges of life, culture, language and world view could not have been in greater contrast. Her ability to travel during this time and witness the experience of the pandemic from different cultures has been a powerful inspiration to shift the emphasis of her work from one of personal reflection to encompassing a wider global perspective.