Sydney-based Sophie Gralton’s signature imagery again explores the realms of vulnerable innocence, curiosity, spontaneity and unbounded potentiality which characterises childhood. The exhibition’s title, Funny By Accident, is a tribute to her daughter Isadora who was an inspirational muse for many years. “She was hands down the funniest kid without meaning to be, ‘funny by accident’ […]
My passion for painting mid century modernism narratives has, at it’s core, of being born in the 1950’s and a love of swimming pools and exploration. The post WWII optimism and economic boom reflects the playful and futuristic aspects of mid century modern design. Motels with large neon signs attracted travellers and highlighted the great […]
“Understanding… that life – and art – can be framed by flowers” Georgina Reid (Cressida Campbell catalogue essay) The olive greens, greys, muted pinks and big blue skies of Scotland have weaved their way through these paintings and flowed across the canvas. To see such vast beauty was hugely inspiring. Wending our way through York, […]
Having recently entered into her ninth decade, Marilyn Peck’s current treasury of watercolour works contains a cornucopia of stories and reminiscences aglow with palladium and gold leaf. The title, More Than Ten Treasures, refers to an early handmade book called Ten Treasures that is ensconced within a handcrafted box. More than this, the exhibition is […]
Memories both personal and historical, as well as a desire for collaborations that transcend complex cultural dichotomies, imbue internationally recognised Avital Sheffer’s current exhibition of ceramic vessels. “Memory feeds desire and desires feeds memory,” relays Sheffer. With an aesthetic rooted in millennia-old Mediterranean and Middle Eastern traditions, the forms manifest a sense of wholeness – […]
I’ve lived on the Gold Coast since the early 80’s. I loved family camping trips exploring the countryside and experiencing the sights such as tropical gardens, beaches, estuaries, fields of yellowed sugarcane growing in uniform grids and attractions like the Big Pineapple. The white timbered ‘Queenslanders’ dotting the countryside, often clinging to the hillsides above […]
The renowned art critic Robert Hughes once stated, “an ideal for humanity is to reconcile with the world, not by protest or irony, but by the ecstatic contemplation of nature.” Melbourne-based Zoe Ellenberg’s inaugural exhibition with Anthea Polson Art offers the viewer a realization of such. Ellenberg tells that the title Birdsong represents “all the […]
Instinctual energy permeates Steve Tyerman’s works. Characterised by an intense involvement in the materiality of paint they are the outcome of an intimate engagement with the environment. However, his art communicates a visual experience well beyond the strictures of traditional landscape painting. “The works are always a reflection of myself and my life experiences made […]
An oast house one might wonder? Such a building can be described as a storied brick structure designed for drying produce, especially hops to flavour the brewing of beer. Apart from allegorical associations, some of Melissa Egan’s current works were in fact painted in an oust house! Her Launceston summertime residence was once an 1840’s […]
The paintings in Kirsten Chambers’ inaugural exhibition with Anthea Polson Art express her profound delight in the Byron Hinterland’s natural environment. Originally from Adelaide, the now Federal-based artist describes her landscapes as mud maps of areas she has a particular connection with. “It is the feeling of place I am trying to capture – how […]
The subjects in Jodie Wells’ current exhibition present as a pageantry of the natural world’s offerings. A procession of peonies, orchids, sunflowers, magpies, kookaburras, wrens, cockatoos and cavorting dogs greet the viewer in an orchestration of shape, hue and tactile surface. Unconcerned with symbolic import, Jodie’s paintings simply express a visual poetic linking with her […]
I like paintings that refuse to make a point. Instead they deliver a mystery, something to be unravelled with input from the viewer. They leave room for personal history to become a player, to ignite a thread that will take its own turns and outcomes and ultimately deliver an emotion and feeling that finds its […]
Melitta Perry’s current paintings manifest the reverberation of bygone experiences, their nebulous quality buttressed by the imagination. “Every telling of a story is an echo,” she imparts. “We are all the sum of our capricious memories and this new body of work explores the way memory distorts and enhances the past, informs the present and […]
Conferred the title Emeritus Professor, Visual Arts upon retirement from Charles Sturt University, David Green relocated to Buderim to immerse himself in his own art practice. Green’s subject matter has ever evolved from reminiscences of earlier life experiences tinged with academic nuances. Speaking of the inception for his current exhibition he discloses, “A random something […]
Buderim-based Veronica Cay’s current paintings and ceramic sculptures viscerally document her musings on the conundrums of societal expectations. She imparts that, as always, her focus is from a female perspective. Certain currently accepted rituals seem quite inane to her, given their roots way back in archaic times. The antipasto analogy in the exhibition’s title relates […]
The imagery in Martin Edge’s new body of work reflects the many journeys throughout SE Queensland and interstate he has embarked upon from his Strathpine home and studio. However, in speaking of the exhibition’s title he states, “Art is the journey!” Since first being represented by APA in 2011, his art has evolved with growing […]
The recent works of New Zealand-based Di West have once again been inspired by images of glamorously clad women from the late 40’s and 50’s Post-War era. “The timelessness of classic fashion and the elegance and grace of certain attire instantly pulls one back into those times,” West imparts. “I grew up watching old Black […]
Brisbane-based Phillip Piperides’ new body of sculptural works is imbued with his abiding interest in Greek mythology and philosophical musings. A career spanning four decades has fostered ruminations upon the passage of time and how to render such into tangible presence. The exhibition displays a number of the graceful female forms for which Piperides is […]
As do photographs, Sophie Gralton’s recent paintings capture significant moments. However, ‘snap shot’ static representations they are not, photographic realism is totally eschewed. Sydney-based Gralton’s focus lies in the interaction between image and medium. She wants us to respond not solely to the subject matter but also to the aesthetic and metaphoric signals a painting […]
Jamie Boyd’s present works communicate a thoroughly immersive engagement with the landscape. Although now based in London, he regularly returns to the Shoalhaven River area in SE New South Wales. It was here that his father Arthur acquired the Riverdale and Bundanon properties in the 1970s. They were subsequently gifted to the Australian people for […]
As in previous bodies of work, Elaine Green’s new paintings emanate a metaphysical sensibility. Each landscape may be understood as the extension of an inner sense of being, or place where Nature and Self are fused. The imagery projects a profound quietude that encourages a state of reflection. “My interest lies in the fleeting nature […]
Official Opening Saturday 25 March 4 – 6 pm Brisbane-based Beth Kennedy’s inaugural exhibition with Anthea Polson Art ushers the viewer into a light-hearted, aesthetic realm beyond extraneous concerns. She tells the title for this body of work, A Pocket Full of Stars, evolved during the isolation and contemplative atmosphere that are prerequisite for the […]
Official Opening Saturday March 18, 3 – 5 pm Paradise lost is a small series of paintings of original Gold Coast houses, some are gone(demolished), and some still exist….maybe? These types of houses were once a common feature of the streets and suburbs along the southernQueensland coast, each are unique and evoke a past era […]
A deeply metaphysical resonance imbues Seabastion Toast’s current works. They communicate a patient seeking of the light amidst the ‘shadowlands’ of emotional and painterly challenges. There is an understanding that life’s cycles will in due course bring a return to the colours of joy. The exhibition’s title, How the Light Gets In, is derived from […]
The underlying theme in Robert Ryan’s paintings has essentially always been about a relationship to one’s surroundings and situation. In mid 2018, he made the decision to leave the now ever bustling, upmarket Byron environ and relocate to Tasmania’s relatively isolated northeast coast. Its remoteness subsequently proved a boon when pandemic circumstances mandated isolation Australia […]
The imagery in Steve Tyerman’s current body of work again expresses his multi-faceted response to the coastal regions of Southern Queensland and Northern NSW. He understands the appeal of being at a seaside locale has, for not only most ‘Aussies’, but humankind in general. “A feeling of connection and sense of release occurs when sitting […]
Describing the imagery that populates his current solo show with Anthea Polson Art, Dean Bowen imparts, “The feathered characters in my avian theatre have players who engage and interact with them. Ladybird armies seem to make regular appearances – are they friends or perhaps dinner for their feathered companions? Echidnas (another of my favorite totems) […]
Judy Oakenfull’s inaugural exhibition at Anthea Polson Art conveys a deep engagement with the natural world. She describes its coastlines and native flora as the ‘protagonists’ in her paintings. “There seems to be something within that draws us towards the ‘untamed’ coast,” Oakenfull imparts. “My work explores this yearning and aims to capture something of […]
Springtime is the season when the natural world revives and reinvigorates. It is a time of joy and new beginnings. Aptly opening in spring, Jodie Wells’ exhibition celebrates the regenerative power of nature and its contribution to a much-needed positivity in our own lives. Jodie’s works express a return to tactility; her luscious markings radiate […]
An intense chromatic energy radiates from Vicki Stavrou’s new body of work. She imparts that the exhibition’s title, Home Spun, is a play on words. Although the imagery has been ‘spun’ from considerations about a home’s exterior and interior design elements, several of her canvas and linen surfaces are now embroidered with spun tapestry thread. […]
With an international reputation as a significant miniaturist, Marilyn Peck has been winning awards and exhibiting, both overseas and in Australia, since 1970. In honour of this venerable artist’s 90th birthday, Anthea Polson Art presents a survey of her work. The exhibition also features Peck’s recent paintings and launches her latest poetry collection which shares the title […]
Art has been considered a mirror where glimpses of life’s meaning may be experienced. The intricate depictions in Jill Lewis’ paintings reflect her deeply philosophical musings. Imbued with a rich texture of otherness, symbolism and imagination, the works defy convention and category. Interior and exterior, visible and invisible, ancient and new, meld together in a […]
‘Seduction is like an invitation, an embellishment, a doorway that beckons the viewer into more subtle enjoyments and meditations.’ Bruce Metcalf Corinne Lewis’s exhibition works embody this notion both in imagery and painterly prowess. Speaking about her subject matter’s inspiration, Corinne alludes to the book, Seduction – a celebration of sensual style. It chronologically explores […]
The canvases in the exhibition explore my daydreams of home and garden. Exotic wildlife visitors are set amidst both tranquil garden vistas and the incongruity of soft furnishings, lavish wallpapers and parquetry floors that furbish domestic spaces. For a long time, our Gold Coast house was just a place to inhabit and produce work but […]
“Turn with your back to the beauty of the water and the lure of the verdant, undulating landscape lies ahead. There’s a mystery as to what is hidden beyond the curving corners of the tracks and roads,” imparts Melbourne-based Cathy Quinn. The title of her current body of work, Hinterland, not only references actual places […]
FORGING
FA M I L I A R I T Y
Preserving the innocence of youth has captivated
Sophie Gralton for twenty seven years, and she’s only
just getting started. Charli Rose Gerry writes.
Northern Rivers-based Melitta Perry’s new body of work evokes a sense of poignancy and hope. Typical of her visual language, sunburnt landscapes stretch to distant ranges under cloudless skies. Abandoned houses and old buildings stand mute in dry grassy fields but native creatures are active, “seemingly exempt from the constraints of time and borders.” Perry […]
Sydney-based Sophie Gralton’s artwork animates a shift in consciousness to a more intuitive, natural realm that is characterisesd by childhood. Fleeting memories and thoughts are revisited and given tangible form on canvases alive with tactile surfaces. Transcending specific locations or personalities, the paintings aim to evoke a sense of integration between days long past, the […]
Recognised as a narrative painter, Sydney-based Tanya Chaitow’s current exhibition is informed by an exploration of the work of the Old Masters, particularly the European paintings from the 18th and 19th centuries where the upper classes are portrayed in bucolic landscapes. Her interest in this era stemmed from a time when she was working directly […]
On the remote North West coast of Tasmania, a small but spectacular peninsula juts out into the expanse of Bass Strait. Here lies the historic township of Stanley that Elaine Green now calls home. Visiting the area a few years ago she’d had an epiphany. ‘While on a holiday exploring Tassie, we’d stopped in Stanley for a couple of days. Strolling along the beach there one morning I suddenly wanted to stay forever!’ Elaine’s current body of work depicts that immersive experience of place. Akin to 19th century Romanticism, her concern is with the intangible qualities; conditions of sky, light and atmosphere – the ever-changing drama of wind, water and clouds, the sweeping forces of nature.
Many of us would acknowledge that we have an old box of memorabilia stored away that we promise ourselves to sort through one of these days. Di West’s current body of works has been inspired by doing just that. Five years ago, she packed up and relocated from Brisbane to the Bay of Islands, New Zealand. Her family had moved from that country to Queensland when she was three years old and became the publicans of the heritage-listed Plough Inn Hotel in Southbank. Her grandfather was licensee of the now demolished Currumbin Hotel, all her school holidays were spent in that locale.
Once upon a time the world seemed younger and magic glimmered in shady bowers or radiated from windswept skies and seas ablaze with vivid hues. The art of Melissa Egan reopens a portal into storylands where all gravity has been cancelled and anything is possible. The titles of the exhibition and many of the works therein, indicate a ‘Sound of Music’ inspiration. Delightful, humour-tinged scenarios dance from the tip of Egan’s brush and we, like the von Trapp children accompanying Maria, follow her into the boundless realms of imagination to discover ‘a few of her favourite things’.
A sense of quietude pervades Robyn Sweaney’s new body of work. The mood is one of introspection and stasis. She explains that her current paintings were created amidst ‘a year of uncertainty and the complexities of a world where our collective experience of multiple lockdowns, orders to ‘stay at home’ and be ‘alone together’ have become the new normal’. The exhibition’s title, Long Road Home, references memories of pre-2020 excursions from Mullumbimby to visit family and the Victorian landscapes of childhood, as well as a 2012 residency in Broken Hill. ‘The vistas and dwellings I had encountered along the way were quite literally, a long way from home!’ remarks Sweaney. ‘More than just reflections on my travels, the imagery embodies the larger issues we’ve all faced. It is about distance, but also love, longing and hope.’
Two very different creative approaches are evident in David Green’s current exhibition. Large, incredibly intricate, dip-pen and ink drawings, that take months to complete, are juxtaposed alongside small, gestural and collaged evocations. ‘When I finish a big drawing, I need to clear my head, so I’ll spend a period of time just having fun,’ Green remarks. ‘My work has always fluctuated between fine line and broad brushstrokes; between drawing, drawing/embroideries and painting,’ he furthers. Green relays that this is in all probability a consequence of working as a freelance textile designer in his early days. A constant changing of styles was required to meet the various companies’ niche markets.
A conversation may be defined as an exchange of sentiments, observations and ideas. Buderim-based Veronica Cay’s new body of works reflects a ruminative dialogue with her materials and subject depiction, as well as certain historical art pieces. The drawings, canvases and ceramic figures portray the imaginary conversations that she’d loved to have shared with an adventurous aunt but lacked the opportunity. The aunt had led quite an extraordinary life. In 1936, at the age of 15, she left a very conservative family in Toowoomba to attend Sydney’s National Art School never to return home.
Working from her studio in the hills behind the small northern NSW town of Mullumbimby, Avital Sheffer creates profoundly beautiful vessels that have attracted international recognition. An exhibition of Sheffer’s hand-built ceramic art resonates the atmosphere of a sacred space. The forms may be thought of as portals between realms past and future, temporal and spiritual. Sheffer tells that the title for her current body of work ‘refers to the capacity of vessels to tell stories, to store knowledge, to keep records of place and time. There is inherent poetry in such intimate, yet collective memory. I perceive material and spirit as inseparable.’
Robert Ryan’s new series of works again engages the viewer in a poetic linking of humanity and the natural world. Picture surfaces pulse with linear activity and an astounding array of biomorphic shapes. Sociological and ecological implications are ever present. The exhibition’s title, I Found an Old Box of Paint, may seem curious but Ryan imparts that it has both a metaphorical and quite literal relevance.
‘I opened an old carton of oil paints that I had discovered during the packing up of my print studio below the Barebones Gallery in Bangalow,’ he explains. ‘Long forgotten, it had been stored away when I was preparing to go overseas in the early 2000’s. Some of the tubes would have been from the mid 90’s… a lot of memories in that box!’
The imagery in Steve Tyerman’s new body of work fosters warm, escapist thoughts of a haven beyond everyday concerns. He tells that the title of the exhibition, An Island in the Sun, refers to the special relationship Australians have with coastal regions. ‘There is something magical about being on the edge of this huge island and looking out to the vastness of the ocean and what lies beyond – and beneath. Despite the ocean’s enormous life-force and the hustle of holiday makers along its beaches, the shoreline has a strangely calming effect.’
Skilfully rendered often-overlooked sites of construction, Peter Smets finds beauty in the stages in-between.
Peter Smets’ new body of work revisits the construction activities that now define his oeuvre. ‘Construction sites have always intrigued me,’ he imparts. ‘One day there is nothing and the next a large building!’ The Gold Coast-based artist tells that what happens during the various stages of construction is fascinating and provides copious inspiration. Enclosed behind high barriers, the men and machinery that raise a building from rubble metaphorically exist ‘in the shadow’. For Smets however, they are the ‘making of works of art in themselves’ and worthy of ‘spotlight’ exposure.
A classical, timeless serenity imbues the sculptures Phillip Piperides creates. ‘More than naturalistic representations, my work is about capturing moments which occupy a space in time,’ he imparts. The title of the exhibition, Images, refers to musings and perceptions personified into 3D form. Understanding the unclothed figure as a ‘landscape’ of soft undulations, Piperides searches for a nuance in a live model’s pose that will evoke the essence of his subject.
Gold Coast-based Marilyn Peck imparts that the exhibition’s miniature artworks are essentially, ‘poetry in motion’. “My second love, after painting, is the writing of poetry,” Marilyn professes. “I approach both the same way. A word or two will set me off and a poem arises with its own rhythm. Similarly, I love the accidental happenings on the picture plane when I drop colour onto wet, hot-pressed Arches paper. These are gifts that ferment the imaginative process.”
Carolyn V Watson’s new body of work, let’s play pretend, extends her ongoing enquiry into how one might “activate the audience’s curiosity by inverting the familiar and thereby offer new readings of the known”. Beyond a childhood game connotation, the exhibition’s title embodies a deeper signification. It arose from her research into the philosophy of the Russian writer, Viktor Shklovsky. His 1917 treatise, Art as Devise, expounds the notion of ‘defamiliarisation’ in the creation and presentation of art forms. Shklovsky asserted that objects deliberately made ‘unfamiliar’ or strange removed the viewer’s “automatism of perception” so that the ‘commonplace’ might be seen as if for the first time. “Art exists so that one may recover the sensation of life,” he declared.
Much of the imagery in Martin Edge’s new body of work revisits urban landscapes he has previously painted. But each time Martin ventures forth from his Strathpine studio he says “it’s like seeing places for the very first time”. An unfailing positivity and sense of humour always accompanies Martin on his adventures. The omnipresent depiction of city cats and ferries signify the process of being ‘out and about’. Awareness of historical features and keen observational skills direct his course and subsequent renderings. Vibratory colours and schematic representations of sites encountered translate his joyful, immersive experiences.
Once upon a time everything in the natural world was growing wild. Over the eons, certain animals, birds and flowers became domesticated or cultivated by humans for practical or aesthetic purposes. Jodie Wells’ new body of work expresses a desire for a more natural state of being; a return to tactility and away from an electronic, virtual reality. The paintings’ surfaces are palpable. We encounter nature in all its wild, textural vividness through the gestural freedom of her palette knife markings. Rather than realist depictions of flora and fauna, her works aim to convey the ‘spirit and energy’ of her subjects.
The physical structures within which we live possess both functional and symbolic qualities, usually an interweaving of both. Home is thought of as a sanctuary – a place to retreat from the world and be oneself. Erica Gray’s current paintings reflect a quest for such. Although the figure is absent from her interiors, a mood of warm intimacy resides amidst the sensuous forces of colour and pattern.
Vicki Stavrou understands the communicative power of colour – it functions as a visual language for her. ‘I am always immersed in thinking about colour. My main goal in painting is to find the most exciting and beautiful combinations that really sing,’ Stavrou declares. In speaking about the exhibition’s title, Golden Daze, she relates that many of her paintings exude an affirmative, golden hue. ‘And sometimes I do feel ‘heady’ being so absorbed in the intensity of my colour choices. Working full-time as an artist is living my dream and that too equates to golden days: Golden Daze.’ Incidentally, the brand of the paint medium Stavrou always uses is called Golden Acrylics.
Sydney-based Sophie Gralton tells that the title for her new body of work, Paint by Numbers, is a ‘tongue in cheek’ jest as to just how opposite her painterly oeuvre is. The antithesis of predetermined, fastidiously rendered illustrations, her concern is the relationship she has with paint: ‘the excitement of the mark, the loss and gains encountered when creating a new work is my impetus.’ Gralton wants us to respond not solely to the subject matter but also to the aesthetic signals the painting communicates. In this quest she employs a direct technique, the loaded brush spontaneously eliciting form and engendering a visceral reaction.
Charles Blackman is one of Australia’s favourite iconic artists. An acute sense of emotional interplay between the viewer, the subject and the artist is at the center of his artworks. He is particularly renowned for his rendition of feelings and the feminine, showing up and focusing on particularities of the most tender and complex emotions that are difficult to express in any other way.
As an introduction to the new Tedder Avenue gallery, Anthea Polson Art presents a selection of limited-edition photographic artworks by the multi-awarded Samantha Everton. The unerring integrity of her photographic processes and an innate ability to access the subliminal in sumptuous visual narratives has won significant international acclaim for the Melbourne-based artist. Numerous series of works spanning 13 years have visually explored subjects “straddling dual worlds” in a quest for self-identity and transcendence amidst cultural variances.
Curious hybrid creatures, schematic figures and plant forms advance and submerge amidst linear markings and colourful geometric shapes. They personify Jill Lewis’s musings about the worlds within and around her. Akin to the intent and pictorial techniques employed by primitive and ancient cultures, the scenarios are invested with symbolism. “As in Egyptian frescoes, the size and position of the characters can be representative of their significance in my own imagined stories,” she imparts.
Secreted somewhere amidst tangles of filigreed foliage may lie the little tadpole and frog pond that was the inspiration for Robert Ryan’s intended new body of works. The pond and its creatures had been a chance discovery he’d made as a child during a brief roadside stop on a long journey. The rebuff of his plea to come see its wonders was his first inkling that he possessed an innate awareness of the ‘other’ shared by very few – the artist’s perspective!
Characterised by an intense involvement in the materiality of paint, Steve Tyerman’s works are the outcome of an intimate engagement with the environment. His art however, communicates a visual experience beyond the strictures of traditional landscape painting. Form, space, colour and light become simultaneously resolved in the immediacy of the palette knife gesture.
The title of the exhibition, As Days Go By, subtly references Martin Edge’s time in his Strathpine studio. The walls are aglow in a bright orange hue – his favourite colour since childhood – and bedecked in photos and clippings. An impressive collection of antique curios provides quiet company. Commenting on his experience of the recent lockdown he says, “It sometimes felt like I was stopped forever at a red traffic light and waiting for it to turn green! But my sense of humour is still going strong, painting makes me happy.” Martin’s vibrant works resonate with his sense of joie de vivre and optimism.
Gold Coast-based Erica Gray imparts that the current exhibition’s paintings and sculptures further her life.e.quatic series in celebrating the vivid colours, intricate patterning and structural complexities observed in a variety of marine creatures, coral formations particularly. Known as the ‘rainforests of the sea’, coral reefs have long been venerated by ancient civilizations for their alchemical, curative and ornamental properties.
Melbourne based artist Cathy Quinn is well recognised for her joyful fluid oil paintings. She creates abstracted landscapes taking pictorial cues from places visited. The artists outdoor scenes are grounded in familiar terrain, yet they are a combination of memories of place melded together to create her own world. She speaks about mood being an important aspect of these works and that time and place evoke the feeling and direction of the painting.
Art expression is a way of attempting to fathom the myriad chaotic inputs entering our consciousness from the everyday world and beyond. Perception, memory and experience may entwine in subsequent scenarios that defy a wholly logical explanation. Veronica Cay describes her collage works and ceramic sculptures as abstract vehicles to encourage reflection upon the human condition. Elucidating the title of her current exhibition, ‘the games that play us and dancing on the moon’, she tells how the altering of a familiar phrase ‘the games we play’ to ‘the games that play us’ connotes the powerful effect words can have on our viewing of a situation: ‘Currently it is becoming increasingly difficult to navigate for the truth of what is happening around us. Given the endless white noise bombarding the senses from so many sources, we may as well be dancing on the moon!’
Sydney-based Sophie Gralton’s new body of work aims to evoke a sense of integration between the past and the present and promote an awareness of the ever-evolving process towards individuation. Her signature imagery of an ‘isolated’ child is largely self-referential but intends a universal relevance. Gralton recounts that the initial inspiration for her oeuvre arose during a trip to Paris in 2007. There she became intrigued with Dutch 17th century portraits of children which were rendered as mini-adults and had hidden layers of meaning encoded in certain symbols and gestures.
‘Everything has a story,’ states Melissa Egan. ‘Not just people, but each creature, tree and stone has a history.’ She understands that the art of story-telling was highly valued in times gone by for it was the means by which a culture’s traditions were kept alive. Melissa’s enchanting visual tales however have a somewhat contrary intent. They transport the viewer far from the everyday and into another world where gravity has been cancelled and specifics of time and place have long since dissolved. In the words of the late Robert Hughes, we are ‘offered a glimpse of a universe into which we can move without strain. It is not the world as it is, but as our starved senses desire it to be.’
At once both intensely personal and universal in implication, Carolyn V Watson’s sculptures and paintings search for a momentary revelation of the inexplicable. There are questions to be asked, riddles to solve. She describes the exhibition as “a playful experiment in expectation”. “I want to activate the audience’s curiosity by inverting the familiar and thereby offer new readings of the known.” The show’s title alludes to the cryptic clues embedded in exaggeration and fables that can unlock a door into another awareness.
The most obvious property of a sculpture is its ‘solidity’ and occupation of real space. Just as in the very earliest shamanistic precursors, sculptures not only describe the shape of things observed but also intuited. The forms may emanate metaphysical and philosophical dimensions that transcend their physical matter. In this exhibition eight artists employing a diverse range of processes and media translate personal understandings of The Shape of Things.
The title of Seabastion Toast’s new body of work embodies the notion of a fleeting, intangible ‘present’. Thought provoking, the apparent contradiction in its conjunction of words serves to liberate the imagination from the confines of convention and a linear reality. “I have a long standing interest in the tension and spaces between dichotomies,” she remarks. “It’s to do with perception. I like the enigmatic title of the show because it speaks of the subjective nature of time; the impermanence of things, the briefly wondrous.”
Rather than ’framing Nature’, Elaine Green’s work has always resonated the 19th century Romantic notion of elevating landscape painting to a metaphysical level. It is seen as the extension of an inner sense of being, a place where Nature and Self are fused. The difference between the observer and the observed is subsumed in a boundless luminosity. ‘Like all artists I am constantly seeking the light,’ she reflects. ‘The troposphere, constantly in motion, provides never-ending inspiration and challenges to capture that light and the changing moods of the environment.’
The title of Seabastion Toast’s new body of work embodies the notion of a fleeting, intangible ‘present’. Thought provoking, the apparent contradiction in its conjunction of words serves to liberate the imagination from the confines of convention and a linear reality. “I have a long standing interest in the tension and spaces between dichotomies,” she remarks. “It’s to do with perception. I like the enigmatic title of the show because it speaks of the subjective nature of time; the impermanence of things, the briefly wondrous.”
The exhibition celebrates Melbourne-based Samantha Everton’s 13 years of internationally recognised and multi-awarded photographic art making. The six series of works each visually explores the ‘straddling of dual worlds’ in a quest for self-identity and transcendence amidst cultural variances. Everton divulges she only subsequently realised that the scenarios and the characters inhabiting them had ‘grown up’ or evolved over the years, finding culmination and resolution in her most recent series, Indochine.
Fanciful, hybrid creatures populate Jill Lewis’s densely textured surfaces. Metaphorical intent imbues the imagery and her ‘silent conversations’. “Painting is my preferred method of communication with the world,” says the Melbourne-based artist. “I think in pictures.” Jill describes herself as a “bit of a people watcher”, revealing that it provides abundant inspiration for her art making. “Observing people’s behaviours from a distance can often tell me more about them than hearing their words. I’m interested in body language and facial expressions, particularly those conveyed in different social situations. It’s about the position characters take when relating to one another within a particular context and space. For me the canvas equates to such a space.”
Like an echo across time and now through the eyes of an adult I revisit the theme of the home, along with other favourite themes and ideas inspired by everyday life and memories of the Australian countryside, city life, travel and literature.
Peter Smets’ new body of work again accents the consequences of progress and technological change upon the landscape and its inhabitants. Carefully researched source material has been meticulously reconstructed in the studio where significant imagery was lifted out of its original context and presented as aesthetic phenomena. The sense of actual place is ambiguous but we inevitably feel a familiarity. Although cultural, environmental and economic interests are implicit, the paintings have an extraordinary psychological presence and metaphorical relevance.
Jodie’s art makes no attempt to capture flora and fauna as a naturalist painter might do. An intense involvement with the materiality of her oil medium lifts her imagery beyond mere representation. The instinctual energy of Jodie’s luscious markings radiates a direct, sensory appeal. We encounter nature in all its textural vividness through the gestural freedom and quality of her palette knife technique. The vitality of Jodie’s tactile surfaces offers an alternative way to respond to our own environments – to experience the pleasure in just looking and feeling without recourse to analysis.
Sir Gawain and the Perilous Graveyard is the final book in Marilyn Peck’s Sir Gawain Trilogy. It is based on a chivalric romance written by an anonymous author in 13th century, the manuscript of which is preserved in the Musee Conde, Chantilly, France. As in Peck’s previous works the text was personally translated from Middle English diction and subsequently illuminated. Fifty-four sumptuous illustrations aspire to manifest the esoteric dimensions inherent in all Arthurian tales.
In cultures dominated by logic, intellect and linear thinking, life can become a problem to be solved rather than a mystery to be enjoyed. Sydney-based Sophie Gralton’s signature imagery animates a shift in consciousness back to a more intuitive realm – that of the vulnerable innocence, curiosity, spontaneity and unbounded potentiality which characterises childhood.
The Charles Blackman survey exhibition at Anthea Polson Art celebrates the ninetieth year of one of Australia’s greatest cultural icons. Charles passed away shortly after his birthday in August this year. A vital force in every sense, he kept working right up until his final days, bringing forth quite illuminated and spiritual images.
Robert Ryan has always immersed himself in the process of life, his paintings interpreting and distilling experience. His new body of work documents recent wayfaring through landscapes of place, time and consciousness. Although embodying two distinct painting styles, the underlying theme remains the individual’s relationship to one’s surroundings and situation. Ryan explains that the show’s title, Moving Backwards, refers not to any sense of reversion or a hankering for bygone circumstances, but the convoluting aspects encountered in relocating home and studio to a faraway region of ancestral significance.
The term ‘rabbit hole’ is a metaphor for an entry into the unknown. Stemming from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, it refers to a journey through nonsensical situations that become increasingly surreal and disorienting. To view Sunshine Coast-based Veronica Cay’s new series of works is to plummet into such a realm. Cay describes…
Howson’s paintings have never been literal representations. Although triangular-roofed houses inform the imagery, they exist as a visual language. His concern lies more in using them as vehicles for abstract investigations into colour value and pictorial structure. Every geometrical shape and motif has been carefully composed to produce aesthetic outcomes. The utilisation of a…
One cannot help but respond to the sense of joie de vivre expressed in Martin Edge’s brightly coloured paintings. It is a quality that earned his work a placement in Canberra’s Parliament House Collection and Artbank, as well as being a finalist in the prestigious Salon des Refuses for three years running. Innately optimistic, Martin paints that which delights him.
Rather than being realistic representations, Quinn’s paintings seek to convey the experience of an immersion in landscape and the joy of special times shared with family and friends. She recounts how everyday concerns evaporate when looking into the expanse above and beyond; her skin brushed by a gentle breeze carrying the clean, salty smell of the sea; the air alive with a chorus of insects.
Acclaimed photographer Samantha Everton will this year present Indochine, a dynamic new exhibition series which explores the intersection of Western influences and Eastern traditions. Indochine depicts a woman navigating the conflicting cultural pressures of the East and the West. Exuding visual luxury and vivid sensuality, the artworks plunge the viewer into a colour-saturated dreamscape. The series explores the encroachment of Western fashion within Asian cultures and the struggle for authenticity amidst contemporary influences.
Sunshine generally connotes warmth, vitality and a sense of contentment. In many world traditions it is synonymous with the radiance of spiritual enlightenment. Although philosophical and ecological musings inform the imagery in Seabastion Toast’s new body of work, her intention is more to do with sunshine’s power to illuminate and educe form. The title of the exhibition really describes what we do as painters, explains Toast. Everything we see is a reflection of light. My subjects operate to map the beams of light as they bounce off form. I am searching for the visual rhythms.
Huge skies vault over brown-grassed plains that stretch to distant horizons. A single house stands seemingly mute in the absence of human habitation. The sense of quietude is profound, but look more closely at Melitta Perry’s landscapes, something is astir – the quickening.
Autumnal harvest festivals throughout the ages have celebrated the forces of nature, bringing the community together to share the joy of abundance and listen to bardic ruminations. The art of storytelling was highly valued for it was the means by which a culture’s traditions and values were kept alive through tales both entertaining and instructive. Aptly titled and timed, Melissa Egan’s latest exhibition presents as a visual cornucopia harvested from the fertile depths of an imagination that ‘garlands’ personal experience and historical vignettes.
Robyn Sweaney is renowned for her images of houses that signify something beyond their often unremarkable facades. A distillation of observed and remembered phenomena, her paintings conjure a sense of introspective quietude. She has always been interested in architectonic precepts, particularly those pertaining to post-war Modernism. Her new body of work however, has been subtly infused with ideas fostered as a consequence of reading the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius’ theories. He believed that architecture affected the everyday life of citizens and therefore should emulate the universal laws of nature.
A classical serenity embues the bronzes Piperides creates. Light gently caresses rounded volumes and lustrous, burnished surfaces. Enormous skill is required in the lengthy and painstaking processes involved in bringing mute, raw materials into a life-suffused, physical reality. Piperides meticulously presides over every stage. In the new body of work, rather than striving for a preconceived outcome, he has responded to the poses his live models have naturally assumed.
An Avital Sheffer vessel resonates a palpable presence born of its primordial substance and her visual articulation of a profound understanding that embraces the natural, corporeal and spiritual worlds. “There is a universal artistic lineage which touches a place that is beyond time and cultural dichotomies,” says the now internationally acclaimed ceramic artist. “The integration of notions of utility, aesthetics and divinity in vessel-form is as ancient as conscious existence.”
Inspiration slips easily into Christabel’s world. Surrounded by gardens, cats, art and music, she doesn’t have to search far to find her pictorial muse. Images appear amidst her daily life; the cat observing a pair of dueling butterflies in her florid garden, her beautiful daughter arriving home clasping a single symbolic rose or an open window with patterned curtains swirled by a gentle breeze. She has explored these images further by focusing on their underlying unifying force, which is that of love.
‘There is a certain sensitivity and heightened awareness, seemingly peculiar to artists, that compels them to investigate the vicissitudes of life – to probe relentlessly at some existential core’. The profound ruminations underpinning Carolyn V Watson’s subject matter may be said to exemplify this dictum. An interaction of medium and meaning, her sculptures and ‘drawn paintings’ on linen embody a dimension of experience that helps define our humanness.
Gordon Richards, featuring in High…
Unconcerned with symbolic import or socio-historic context, Jodie Wells’ paintings simply present a poetic linking with her domestic environment. “My studio is in my house, so working from home I have found inspiration from those things that are near to me – the objects and animals that I notice while doing my everyday activities and down at Byron Bay where I buy my art supplies,” says the northern Gold Coast artist.
Coalescing, dissolving – ever shifting, clouds and mists wreath primordial peaks in Elaine Green’s new body of work. The imagery portrays the majesty of the northern NSW landscape but also emanates a metaphysical sensibility.
Veronica was given a merit award for her piece Passage in…
Carolyn has won the Shillam Award – top prize at…
Martin was awarded the local artist prize at the…
The focus of Sydney-based Sophie Gralton’s art lies in the quality of interaction between medium and meaning. For her, what matters most is not visual accuracy but the relationship between image and ground and the seduction of visual surfaces. It is a misconception to think of Gralton’s work as primarily a nostalgic reflection on bygone times. On the contrary, she eschews any notion of sentimentality.
It is impossible not to become absorbed in the refined detail and mood of a Peter Smets’ painting. Never a mere recorder of visual facts, he deconstructs our habitual ways of seeing. With consummate skill, he persuades us that the contemporary world of industry and technology offers unexpected opportunities for aesthetic musings. Although the imagery in Smets’ new body of work revisits the construction sites that define his oeuvre, he tells that his interest is currently focused on the men who work there, albeit they are for the most part depicted in quiet moments of respite.
Art, like life, is an undulating dance alternately radiant in possibilities, shadowed with limitations and then bright with resolution. A visceral understanding of such permeates Veronica Cay’s ceramic sculptures, collaged works and drawings which she describes as vehicles to encourage a reflection upon the human condition. “Manifesting the struggle in their making, the imagery can be complex and sometimes appear unresolved but this is purposeful as my intention is to express what it is to be human with all our frailties evident,” she offers. This sensibility was recently recognised with a successful exhibition in Berlin’s renowned August Strasse gallery district, as well as an invitation to present a course in Mexico City late last year.
A Melissa Egan painting has the power to transport the viewer far from the everyday and into another world where gravity has been cancelled and notions of time and place have long since dissolved. In her current series of works, the characters inhabiting the luminous realms reference those ‘quiet’ heroes who enliven our sensibilities and collude in our escapist dreams: the artists, poets, explorers and dissidents who have valiantly defied the status quo of their times.
Sweaney is nationally recognised for her images of houses that sensitively document a way of life now in flux and her recent paintings….
Gordon Richards celebrates the simple pleasures in works of art that bring visual delight to the viewer. His universe is one of light and radiant energy. “I am always attracted to the light dancing between objects and glinting off surfaces. Most of my images have a strong point of light. Light also refers to the subjects I convey through paint and charcoal,” he smiles. “The compositions are a bit like impromptu drawings or visual ramblings based on musings of events past and present.”
The title, Spring, is an apt one for Jodie Wells’ latest exhibition which opens in a season when all nature quickens and we too experience…
Thank You Fiona Purdon and the Sunday Mail magazine – U on Sunday – for…
The logic of reproducing appearances has been abandoned in Cathy Quinn’s, shimmering, ambiguous landscapes. “My current practice is…
Congratulations also to Martin Edge on his selection as…
Congratulations to Robyn Sweaney on her selection as…
Congratulations to Robert Ryan who is a Finalist in…
The evidence of process and a respect for the handmade is an integral component in all of Carolyn V Watson’s works. One can feel the maker’s energy in them as they embody life, time and the decisions made.
She has just received an email confirming her pre-selection for…
Moon-silvered clouds drift through the immensity of inky night skies. Far below, moonlighting activities are…
Avital Sheffers vessels embody the story of humanity with an aesthetic rooted in millennia-old Mediterranean and…
For the last thirty years I have endeavoured to create work that will inspire, delight and surprise. In the past I have explored form and colour using clay which becomes ceramic, wax which becomes bronze, fibreglass, as well as paint and ink on canvas and paper. Now I am intrigued by…
Anthea Polson Art is privileged and delighted to present an exclusive exhibition of Charles Blackmans black and white drawings from the 1970s and onwards. The series has been selected by Christabel Blackman from a personal…
Characterised by a vitality of spontaneous gesture, the Border Track paintings are the outcome of an unusual combination of athleticism and creativity suffused with philosophical and ecological concerns. Running is when I do most of my thinking and escaping…
In her latest exhibition Utopia, Brisbane artist Melissa Egan depicts a natural harmony between humans…
Utopia is an imagined place in which everything is perfect, an Eden or Happy Valley where humanity is content and in harmony with nature. Melissa Egans new body of work has been created with…
We would like to thank Domaine Serisier, in association with Bordeaux and Beyond…
Christabel Blackmans new works again invite us to enter a rhapsodic world governed by sensory delight and the eternal moment. An evocative writer, she shares the memories and dreams that have inspired these paintings…
I recently returned to my Spanish studio which lies on the out-skirting hills of a medieval…
Jodies subjects are not consciously invested with any symbolic import. They quite simply convey a delight in the natural world expressed through a deep engagement with the plasticity of her…
Gordon Richards universe is full of light and radiant energy. He is a painter whose creative impulse is essentially life affirming and celebratory.
LOS ANGELES 28/04/15: Photographer Samantha Everton was presented with the 8th Annual International Color Awards Nominee title in the category of fine art at a prestigious…
On Saturday February 28 Anthea Polson Art, in conjunction with Peter Cahill of Domain Hill Property Group and KUD Architects, will be holding a Survey exhibition of Samantha Evertons work during the official launch of the 2 Girls Building in Abbotsford Victoria…
A celebration of the ‘dance of life’, Marilyn Peck’s retrospective exhibition chronicles an evolving aesthetic through the mediums of painting, storytelling and poetry. Marilyn Peck’s creative output has been prodigious…
With a keen and inventive eye, Smets paints a broader range of luminance than is usually visible. The extraordinary realism he achieves owes much to his…
Although representations of a specific location, Tyermans art communicates a visual experience beyond the strictures of traditional landscape painting. His vistas manifest a palpability as considerations of form, space, colour and light are resolved in the immediacy of…
At once both intensely personal and universal in their implication, ten intimately small, painted works and three remarkable sculptures express Carolyn V Watsons endeavour to elicit ‘moments of empathy’ through a visual and ‘poetic triggering’…
Christabel Blackmans extraordinary life imbues her luminous paintings. Being the daughter of painter Charles Blackman and writer Barbara Blackman ensured a most atypical childhood, much of it spent in far off lands. She is consequently fluent in five languages…
There is a tendency now to view life in terms of fixed compartmentalised states, whereas we really live in a world of continuity and are part of an ongoing fluid…
Samantha Everton possesses an innate ability to access interior states of being in sumptuous visual narratives that have profound cross-cultural, sociological and…
Feathered creatures have been traditionally thought of as mediators between the material and spirit worlds.
Each painting in the Topia series is as carefully and lovingly wrought as the manicured gardens they depict. Designed with meticulous attention to detail, colour interactions and compositional factors, a curious glow emanates
There is a timeless serenity to the bronzes Phillip Piperides creates. Light gently caresses rounded volumes and lustrous, burnished surfaces. A union of ideal and reality, the figures convey a profoundly Classical air. Beyond the anatomical perfection and modulated play of light, the works engage the viewer at a deeper, more contemplative level.
Mad, bad and dangerous to know, so goes the cautionary saying about bad boys. Cocky, brash, and…
It has been said that the traditions of the past provide the platform from which the artist makes his leap of imagination…
The aesthetic beauty of flowers has inspired poets and artists throughout the ages and especially the rose that was considered to be the queen of all flowers. Universally, the rose is the flower of love, symbolising…
Although Michael Jeffery maintains a philosophical connection with wilderness regions, his art translates a very different environment, one totally insulated from nature…
Coming back to Byron after a year of living and painting in a seaside shack at Broomes Head, Robert Ryan discovered…
An exhibition of Avital Sheffers hand-built ceramic art resonates the atmosphere of a sacred space. Spot lit, and standing on their plinths of varying heights, it is…
With the cadence of poetry, Peter Smets persuades us that the contemporary world of industry and technology holds infinite resources of undiscovered beauty. He plays the role of…
Robert Ryan’s new series of works on canvas and paper explore the delicate nature of balance in life, ecology and the creative process itself. The paintings refer to no specific place or time but rather, relate an individual’s relationship to the environment – be it natural or otherwise. Akin to a map of intricate poetic notations, Ryan employs the physical exterior to express aspects of his own interiority.
What strikes one first about Simon Collins’ works is the utter confidence of his painterly approach. It is a quality that has earned him considerable attention with the inclusion of paintings into some of the nation’s most prestigious art prizes. This new series again expresses the importance a sense of place has for him.
Anthea Polson Art in conjunction with the Queensland Festival of Photography presents a survey exhibition of photographic artworks by multi-award winning Samantha Everton. It is an opportunity to view a selection of the Melbourne-based artists critically acclaimed Marionettes,Vintage Dolls, Childhood Fears and more recent Wolf series.
Thoreau’s words, “Know your own bone; gnaw it, bury it, unearth it, and gnaw it still” inform Carolyn V Watson’s conceptualisation and absolute rigour of process in producing “intimately veiled” paintings and “scorched raw” sculptural…
Although the Blue to Red paintings contain three distinct bodies of work, the underlying theme is the individuals relationship to the environment – the finding of connections between human experience and the rich, metaphorical resonances of the natural world.
The physical structures within which we live and work possess functional and symbolic qualities, and usually an interweaving of both. Robyn Sweaney confesses other people’s houses have always fascinated her
In a pageant of shimmering colour, Nick Howson chronicles the fabled events of times past and present. Many of the works reference memories of a journey he made through ancient lands and the art treasures encountered there. The awe and inspiration
There has always been something unsettling and yet strangely familiar about Samantha Everton’s imagery. It lures us in and holds us spellbound as we ponder the source of our curious fascination. Anthea Polson Art is indeed privileged to host the national launch of Marionettes, Everton’s latest series of photographic art…Marionettes extends her visual exploration of interior states of being, but here the focus has shifted from that of the child’s, to ‘grown-up’ issues of isolation and loss of control under the pressures of daily life.
Gordon Richards celebrates the simple pleasures in works of art that bring visual delight to the viewer. Inspiration for his latest body of work first surfaced in fond reminiscences of his ‘Noosa years’. Back in the ’90’s, that seaside playground had been the place where he’d famously exchanged his chef’s cap and kitchen utensils for the proverbial artist’s beret and paintbrushes. Richards’ new career path proved to be an exciting creative outlet and ultimately, an enormously successful venture.
Anthea Polson Art is privileged to present for the first time in Queensland, a selection of magnificent, limited edition photographic artworks by multi-award winning Samantha Everton. It will be a rare opportunity to view the Melbourne-based artist’s critically acclaimed Vintage Dolls and Childhood Fears series. The exhibition is a prelude to her forthcoming new body of work that will have its national premier with Anthea Polson Art in March 2011…
There is a timeless serenity to the bronzes Piperides creates. Light gently caresses rounded volumes and lustrous, burnished surfaces. A union of ideal and reality, the figures convey a profoundly Classical air. But beyond the anatomical perfection and sensitive play of light, the works engage the viewer at a deeper, more contemplative level. There is a sense of complete quietude to the self-sufficient repose of each figure. Free of restless energy, Piperides’ bronzes seem to represent a state of being which defies all worldly concern.
Working from her studio in the hills behind the small northern NSW town of Mullumbimby, Avital Sheffer creates the award winning, profoundly beautiful vessels that have been collected by numerous Australian public galleries and museums.
A finalist in last year’s Sulman and Wynne art prizes at the AGNSW, the technical virtuosity of Peter Smets’ technique is undeniable.
The image potency of Michael Jeffery’s art assaults the senses. But beyond the intense colour, geometric complexity and his extraordinary facility for composition, lies a deep philosophical intention
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