Bleu Lagoon

This mixed media painting is part of a collection of work from my residency in Provence last year. The theme running through all the works are these extraordinary white limestone monolith mountains called Les Alpilles that circle the towns of Mausanne, St Remy and Arles.
This stunning deep lagoon in Mausanne was exciting subject matter for plein air with the ever present Les Alpilles mountains making an interesting backdrop. I painted this work entirely on location using mixed media of gouache, acrylic, ink, pastel and collage to give a gestural, lively atmosphere to this vivid landscape.

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My formal art training began at Queensland College of Art studying Visual Communication and Graphic Design as well as filmmaking. I later won a scholarship at the Australian Film and Television School and pursued a filmmaking career for 18 years and finally returned with a passion for visual arts.
During my art/painting practice in these past 30 years I have experimented with many mediums and in all genres, but what continues to hold my interest and where I consistently revisit is the landscape and objects within the landscape. I also like to explore the concept of dual worlds where order and chaos compete with each other - where the representational morphs into elements of abstraction.
A lot of my figurative landscapes are allegorical set against sweeping abstracted skies which set the stage for the drama to unfold. My work practise finds my doing a lot of research and preliminary paint sketches and the ideas may come from a piece of poetry, mythology, ancient history or from my own photography. In recent years I have been preoccupied with 18th century Baroque and Rococo eras.
I have been fortunate to have been selected as a finalist in the National Still Life Art Prize for the past 6 years as well as winning landscape and portrait awards in the Coffs Harbour and Sawtell Art Prizes over the past 12 years. In 2019 my painting was featured in the Television Series, The Block.