“Feel the ocean.” That is the primary drive behind my paintings. In 2022, our family moved from Durban in South Africa to Adelaide in South Australia. I paint in a contemporary impressionist technique that is a type of fusion between traditional and experimental paint application. Though I enjoy exploring various subjects, my focus is on marine life and the ocean, for which I have spent much time at aquariums (consulting marine biologists), snorkelling, and traveling to remote beaches to capture the sea turtle nesting and hatching. Over the past few years these themes have captivated me, especially since I began spending more time in the surf again, as I used to with my brothers when we were much younger. I started noticing the fish and lifeforms sharing the waves while becoming increasingly interested in colour theories and light effects that I read about. There is an elegance and beauty in marine life, and I began to study how light interacts with water both above and below the surface. I have also come to learn that our relationship with the ocean is not neutral, as these lifeforms have the ability to evoke great emotions in our being. My underwater subjects primarily began with the various sea turtle species and have expanded to include other forms of life, such as sharks, groupers and rays.
I am privileged, over the years, to have had solo exhibitions, sold work through galleries, exhibited at shows, enjoyed successful commissions, won some awards, and featured in publications, but it is always about paying acute attention to how light interacts with the subject and how best I can interpret that genuine sensation through, for instance, a broken colour technique of the famous impressionists.
In 2023, I won a Best in Show at the Campbelltown Art Show and a Merit Award at the RSASA Winter exhibition. My paintings are on display in the Montville Art Gallery – a vibey town in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast of Queensland. Towards the end of 2023, I completed and submitted a PhD study that consists of a series of paintings that explore the role that art can play in marine life conservation and ecological preservation within the greater Anthropocene debate. Up until 2022, I exhibited and sold artworks in South Africa at The Green Gallery (Mount Edgecombe), The Gallery (Lifestyle Centre in Ballito), Makiwa Gallery (Umhlanga), as well as the DUT Art Gallery. I featured on the cover and had an eight-page spread in the South African Artist magazine in 2021.
I very much look forward to hearing from you and I hope you enjoy the artworks on display.