ARTIST BIO

My training as a secondary art teacher led to a very happy career in education at Eltham High School spanning the years from 1976 – 2009. I have been fortunate to work with students, teachers and a local community committed to pursuing a love of the arts.

I continue to be fascinated by the exploration of and the expressive qualities inherent in different materials – oil, acrylic, watercolour, gouache, printmaking, textiles and  mixed media.

Whilst I love making art in all forms my real love is creating paintings that are a celebration of the Australian landscape. I attempt to capture the spirit of the places that I have become familiar with over many years. In particular I am drawn to and continually paint the coastal bush and seashore of the Mornington Peninsula, the Victorian alpine regions and the Eltham environment where I have lived and worked for 40 years.

My responses are expressed in a range of media including ‘plein air’ water colour and gouache studies, collages and oil painting. I love the unpredictability and spontaneity of working with watercolour. Combining its intensity with the immediacy of opaque gouache colour is magic for me. I enjoy pushing the limits and defying the rules by using layers of semi transparent colour and working light over dark and dragging and scumbling the paint to imitate the textures in nature.

Likewise with oil painting my subject is primarily the medium and the exploration of layering transparent and opaque colour, controlled and spontaneous mark making and an attempt to capture the richness of our surroundings.

SHOWS

2019 -  Flinders Art

            2019 - Mornington Rotary Art Show        

            2018 -  Mount Eliza Art

2018 -  Flinders Art

            2017 -  Eltham Library Arts Space, ‘Unveiling Union’ (group show)

            2016 - Mornington  Peninsula Art

2016 -Flinders Art, Community Exhibition – Honorable Mention Award

            2015 -  Tussock Upstairs (group show) Point Lonsdale

            2015 -  Flinders Art

            2015 -  Mornington Peninsula Art

            2014 -   Eltham Library, ‘Presence and Absence’ (group show)

2014 -  ‘Recent Paintings’ (2 persons) at Lovegroves Winery, Cottles Bridge

            2013 -  Mornington Peninsula Art,  Flinders, 

2012 – Tussock Upstairs ( group show) Point Lonsdale

            2012 – OAK HILL ‘postcards exhibition’ – ‘2^ndprize’

            2011 -  OAK HILL – “ANALOGY”  

            2011 – Flinders Art Show – “Highly Commended”

            2010 -  OAK HILL MORNINGTON, various shows eg Little Archies,   

            2010 - ‘Seven’ at Victorian Artists’ Society  (group show)

            2010 - ‘Taut Connections’ - Lovegroves Winery Cottles Bridge (group)

            2010 – ‘Live, Love, Life’ – Australian Guild of Realist Artists (group)

            2009 – ‘Mixed Encounters’ at Victorian Artists Society (group show)

            2009 – ‘Earth, Wind, Water’ at OAK HILL (group).