It is so wonderful to welcome you to Manyung Gallery! Congratulations on your upcoming solo exhibition ‘Spring Light’. Can you share with us what inspired this collection?
Thank you and it is so special to be exhibiting for the first time with the Gallery.
I find my work is affected by the seasons. I tend to paint what is around me. The colour palette and the subject matter, so this body of paintings are mainly landscape based. I live in a rural area, and it is a cooler climate, so the seasons, the falling of leaves, the frosted grass or the colours of new growth influence my work. If it’s raining, if it’s sunny, this alters my palette and what draws me to create a painting.
Is there a particular piece from “Spring Light’ that stands out for you? (Maybe one you are most fond of, or a piece that challenged you more than others?)
Each painting has a particular ‘pull’ for me. But I suppose if I had to pick one or two, (which by the way, my ‘favourites’ are rarely the one the viewers pick!) I would choose ‘Solitude II’ and ‘Serenity’. Both ‘lighter’ paintings in colour. “Solitude II’ came about rather quickly, but Serenity took more time and layering. It is a larger work as well, but it was more than that. I contemplated this one more. It ‘cooked’ a lot longer in the studio.
What do you hope people will feel when viewing your work from this exhibition?
I hope that people feel some peace and tranquillity, maybe some comfort in my paintings.
We’d love to learn more about your creative process. How do you go about starting a new body of work?
I have spent many years as mainly a Plein Air painter. In the past few years, I have been enjoying spending more time in the studio, particularly when I work on larger paintings. However, I still sketch and work from remembered colours and shapes, which is how these works have developed. It has also helped me to push more to semi-abstraction. I also work small studies in Gouache, and this often helps to develop composition and colour.
You capture the colours and light of the Australian landscape beautifully. Do you predominately work with the same palette and mediums, or do you experiment based on each individual piece/collection?
A colour palette is something that I work out before hand, mixing my colours and roughly tones of the colours on my palette. I will often photograph areas of colours in the real landscape to influence me. These can be close up of grasses or moss on stones, bark on trees… I often do this on my walks with the pups.
You have spoken before of your interest in Australia’s early female landscape artists, who are the biggest inspirations for you, both past and present?
So many!!!! How to choose a few main influences? They have varied over the years. When my work was more ‘structured’, Margaret Preston, and the varied artists of the 1930’s onwards. Such as Dorrit Black, Alison Rehfish. And of course, the master, Clarice Beckett.
Can you share some of the highlights you’ve had so far in your artistic career?
Being invited to enter and then collected into the Kedumba Drawing Award which has the who’s who of Australian Art in their collection. And being a finalist in some of the well-known prizes such as the Paddington, Mosman and NSW Parliament Plein Air Art Prizes.