Manyung Gallery is excited to be presenting Julie Hutching’s first exhibition upon her return from France after being awarded the 2017 Yulgilbar Fellowship. Julie had the privilege of spending time in the North of France and into Belgium, as well as spending time in Paris.

As with all of Julie’s works, this series showcases her love of mark making, experimentation with layers and her response to the surface of the work as much as the subject. Drawing has always been an important cornerstone in Julie’s work. The western tradition tends to see drawing as a preliminary practice, one that allows the artist freedom to ‘get it right’ for a larger canvas. Artist’s on the other hand tend to see drawing as absolutely central to their practice – if you can’t draw properly, you’ll never paint properly.

Drawing has so many paradoxes – it takes dedication to become a Master of it, but it allows an artist so much freedom in experimenting with line and surface. Drawing can be completely unforgiving, it has a transparency in the surface that you can’t hide with layers of paint. But by its very nature, it also encourages so much artistic freedom to take chances and to push their artistic practice.