On Thursday and Friday last week I went on an adventure to Outback Queensland. I flew from Brisbane to Roma and then was driven to Mitchell, which is about an hour west of Roma. I had a great time!
I went out west to judge the Mitchell Art Show. When I was invited to be the judge, a few months ago, I jumped at the opportunity to return to the country and look at art. And, none of it disappointed.
The very active local Mitchell Art Group has been hosting the annual art show and competition for 14 years. It is an efficiently run exercise that attracts art from the local area and further afield. Local art shows are incredibly important for all sorts of reasons. I take my hat off to the organisers of the Mitchell Art Show and all the contributors. I spent 18 years being involved, with many others, in the Goondiwindi Art Show and I know what it's like to be organiser, exhibitor, hanger, provider, and more!
I judged painting, sculpture and photography sections, plus a couple of junior sections. The Maranoa Art Gallery, in the main street of Mitchell, is a great space. It is obviously a cultural hub for the townspeople and for those who live in the surrounding region.
The overall winner was a young grade 12 student from Roma, Darcy Foott. He won with an amazing photograph. It is an image which takes an iconic piece of rural infrastructure ie: the high water tank into new perspectives! The tank stand was under-lit in a theatrical manner revealing a kind of sculptural essence. Darcy had taken a shot looking upwards capturing the tank stand's lit underbelly and then taking the viewer beyond to the glittering night sky.
Many people drove for an hour or more to attend the opening on Friday night. It was a fun night where, after speeches by me, organises and sponsors, I settled into lots of chatting, plus catching up with old school friends!
And, because you normally see photos of me in my painting gear, here's a photo of me all dressed up for the Art Show opening.
TWO HORIZONS Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm
I chose to upload Two Horizons with this post, because it reflects the country/city elements of my life. I am sure many people can relate to this, for all sorts of reasons. This was painted in 2002, so over ten years ago. There's an old saying...it goes something like this...The girl may leave the country, but the country never leaves the girl.
Why? Because I have been so busy lately I have not done any painting...so if you'd like to read about my recent work please check out MULTIPLE LANDSCAPES
COSMIC ADDRESS
My next exhibition:
15 to 27 October 2013 at Graydon Gallery, Brisbane.
I am really excited about this show. Shall keep you posted!
3. Finalist in 'Seeing Stars' Art Award. Hosted by the SKA [Square Kilometre Array, the world's largest telescope]
1. Multiple Landscapes Regular readers will know of my interest in the concept of seeing multiple perspectives, literal and metaphoric. I suggest that skills in seeing multiple perspectives, even simultaneously, are imperative as we move through the 21st century. The cavalcades
of new discoveries about the Universe demand it.
So, to my new painting Multiple Landscapes. Yes, it is a 'loaded' title. It can be 'read' as a painting of two literal landscapes, maybe even more if the viewer sees landscape in the negative spaces. Yet, I was thinking a bit more deeply than that! These are some of those thoughts [but not all of them!!!]:
MACRO-MICRO
The landscape on the right is representative of the macro world, the world of vastness, great size and distance. The other, almost 'mirror' landscape, is representative of the micro world, that dimension that embraces its own type of vastness, one that cannot be seen, yet holds energy forces that drive existence. The two 'sides' of landscape encapsulate the concept of the ouroboros, the age-old symbol of the snake eating its own tail, used by modern cosmologists to visually describe the relationship between the cosmic and quantum worlds. Regular readers will know that I have used this symbol in my paintings. Here are a couple of links COSMIC OUROBOROS and OUROBOROS
PSYCHE
I was thinking that 'landscape' is a metaphor for psyche. The seemingly mirrored landscapes in Multiple Landscapes could be variously the conscious and subconscious, the ego and shadow, order and disorder, being awake and dreaming. The negative spaces offer a tantalising suggestion that there's more to discover.
AMBIGUITY
I was keen to make the orientation of the landscapes somewhat ambiguous. Yet, as I have presented the painting above ie: horizontally, the tops of the mountains 'read' as the horizon. Yet, the 'bottom' of the landscapes can also be 'read' as an horizon. When flipped on its side the painting takes on another perspective.
UN-TETHERING LANDSCAPE
Regular readers will know of my interest in un-tethering concepts of landscape from being Earth-bound. In an age where cosmological research is revealing more and more about the close and far distances of the Universe, I believe it is important that concepts of 'landscape' extend to embrace cosmic perspectives. Why? Because these kinds of perspective clearly show that Earth is our home and the Universe is our environment. We have nowhere else to go [at least for the long present!], so we'd better look after our home. With Multiple Landscapes I was also thinking about a Universal 'landscape' that reaches across time and space. I have previously written about my ideas on un-tethering landscape...here's one previous post UNTETHERED LANDSCAPE
A recent article 'Can The U.S. Create A National Park On The Moon' reveals a lot about attachment. It also scarily heralds a need to really question our behaviour towards 'landscape' in the broadest sense. Imagine if Earthly nations started pegging out Space, colonising with a national identity. 'Navel gazing' leads to small horizons and potentially dangerous actions, because the perspective used is not multi-dimensional.
Time to ponder is an important part of my process...I sit and ponder - What next?...if anything. Pondering gives time for the realisation that something may or may not need more.
3. 'Seeing Stars' Art Award
My painting Where? [image below] is a finalist in the 'Seeing Stars' Art Award.
'Seeing Stars' is a celebration of art and astronomy inspired by the world's largest telescope - the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) which will be co-hosted here in Australia.
Click HERE to find details of the finalists. When you are on the page, click OPEN FINALISTS and you will be taken to a page which shows all the finalists artwork.
There were around 2,000 entries with 177 finalists. I am very excited about my painting being one of them.
I will be sending Where?to Melbourne for the exhibition of finalists works, which will be at Federation Square from August 13. The judges will be deciding a winner at this.
VOTE: You can be involved too. There's a vote for a 'People's Choice'. On the page of images'Where?' is first on the third row...that's if you want to vote for me!!! To vote...for any work...you tick 'My Favourite' and then at the top of the page there is a 'Submit' button.
Paolo Uccello The Battle of San Romano Tempera on panel 182 x 317 cm c.1438-40
National Gallery in London
Click HERE to see all three The Battle of San Romano paintings together.
What inspires me? Lots of things, too many to list. But, I will write about a few here.
And, why did I place 'process' in the title with 'inspiration'? As you will see I am inspired by the processes I use and the surprises they provide.
Regular readers will know that cosmology, age-old symbols, ideas...all inspire me. But, I thought I'd gather in some of those inspirations I have not written about as much or at all.
Firstly let's concentrate on a couple of inspirations that are not part of my literal process, but still hit me in the guts or heart or brain...or all three at once.
PAOLO UCCELLO 1397 -1475
I have to start with an artist who I have loved since I first encountered his work in my secondary school art class. He is the early Renaissance Florentine artist is Paolo Uccello . I did not see his three Battle of San Romano paintings in the flesh, so to speak, until I was in my mid twenties. The first encounter was at the National Gallery in London [painting above], then the Uffizi in Florence and the Louvre in Paris. The London and Florence paintings are the ones that moved me the most. When I first saw them I had physical reactions...heart missed a beat, gut felt like it had been turned inside out [in a good way!], and my brain was just so excited.
What do I love about the painting above? The answer involves the patterning, movement, action, colours, the pastoral landscape, the composition which moves the eye effortlessly around the image, and Uccello's early experiments with perspective. The answer also involves something I cannot explain, but I definitely feel very strongly. In 2002 I spent 6 weeks in London, when I had my own show there. I regularly visited the National Gallery to see the The Battle of San Romano. The feeling did not diminish...a feeling of expectancy.
In 2002 Dr Sally Butler wrote an article for Eyeline magazine about Cutlines, a major painting/installation I exhibited at Brisbane's Soapbox Gallery [now closed]. A 120 x 900 cm work on paper wrapped around two walls of a room in the gallery. In her article Butler wrote in reference to my sense of landscape:
In this regard the work of Italian painter Paolo di Dono Uccello (1397-1475) is a strong influence for the artist. There is a plastic strength in Uccello's paintings that derives from his interest in geometry and his fascination with the way forms can be arranged in a pattern or scheme that is meaningful in itself. His art promotes the notion of a geometry of our environment, or more particularly, how we formulate a geometry of our environment in order to understand it. Kathryn Brimblecome-Fox's landscapes share this plasticity and sense of spatial organisation that comes from within. Eyeline 49 Spring 2002 P.38
But let's propel ourselves from the fifteenth century to now. I was recently alerted to a French musician who calls himself Woodkid He is also a songwriter, music video director and graphic
designer. In March 2011 he released his debut single Iron...also a music video. It is fantastic and inspiring! AND, reminds me so much of National Gallery of London's Uccello, The Battle of San Romano. They both share a magic that's expectant and complete at the same time. They both depict battles, which can be interpreted literally and metaphorically. They both move in the same direction. Whilst Iron is without a landscape context, I feel The Battle of San Romano's echoes into it across time.
Take a look at the Youtube video of Iron below and see what you think. I am inspired!
Regular readers will know that the flat treeless Pirrinuan Plain of my childhood home has been a very strong influence and inspiration for me. The distance...living in it at the same time as observing it...being embraced by horizon...seeing and feeling perspective...witnessing seasonal patterns in the flourish of new crops and their demise at harvest...noting the geometry carved into the landscape by humans at the same time as noticing natural patterns, shapes, movements...rejoicing in the sky, a constantly changing sight from day to night, from relentlessly blue to threatening grey and more...the milky way at night reaching towards us with light and sparkle bringing us closer.
My brother Wilfred Brimblecombe has a photography BLOG where he posts photographs he has taken over many years, as well as now. He as a number of photographs of our family farm on the Pirrinuan Plain. Pirrinuan is a very small railway siding outside Dalby on the rich and fertile Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. The photograph below is from Wilfred's BLOG When you visit his BLOG look at the listing of TAGS on the right hand side. Click on Pirrinuan, Dalby and Glencoe to see more of my childhood landscape. Our parents sold the farm in the mid 1980s.
The painting below is inspired by many things, including growing up at Pirrinuan. The Beginning of Everything is both a vast and intimate painting. I write about my childhood landscape in the post I wrote for this painting. You can read it HERE.
The process I use to create my paintings inspires me. How? The preparatory stages involve accidents which I allow to happen, without fear and with much anticipation. Once I have painted the canvas a colour I then splash turps across it. I will then place the stretched canvas flat on the ground or at a slight incline or lean it up against something. Whatever I do allows the paint to do its own thing... run, trickle, pool. I will 'orchestrate' this with a couple of layers of colour. I literally do not have any idea what the canvas will look like...and I like this because it seems to 'speak' to me.
I may have some ideas for the painting in my head, but the prepared canvas also informs the ultimate visual direction. It could be a difficult dance together, but it is not. I really do get excited when a prepared canvas awaits me and I look forward to the hours I will spend with it.
Last Thursday night I attended a terrific presentation 'Archetypes of Chaos' by anthropologist Dr. Jonathon Marshall at the Qld Jung Society . Dr Marshall spoke about the agency of chaos, from a number of perspectives eg: paradox, trickster, mythology and more. In the act of creation both order and chaos have potencies to play. In a sense by allowing the paint and turps do their own things I invite chaos into the painting process. I am not totally in control. I am seeking to have my mind scattered so that I might 'find' things I did not know were there! Yet, when people see the final production they comment on the detail and precision of my work. However, it is essentially a veil or another dimension...and that can lead to lots more inspiration! Look below the surface...literally and metaphorically.
Below are some photos of the early stages of my next painting. I wonder how it will end up?
The initial paint
The initial paint still wet
After the turps has been splashed around, and the paint and turps do their unscripted 'dance' together.
The second layer of colour on top of the first dry layer. The painting leaning up against the old wardrobe is Are We There Yet?
The second layer also disturbed by splashes of turps....drying now....and 'speaking' to me! Asking me to 'dance' too.
In my last post Super-Earths I also uploaded some photos of THE PROCESS. Oh, and a video as well.
Last week it was reported that astronomers discovered a nearby star system with 3 possible 'Super-Earths' within the habitable zone around the star. Super-Earths are planets less massive than Neptune, but more massive than our own Earth. These newly discovered Super-Earths have the potential to sustain life. A 'habitable zone' refers to the temperature region around a star where liquid water could exist. Planets outside our solar system are called exoplanets.
If you want to know more check out the articles linked above.
SUPER-EARTHS DISCOVERED
Oil on linen 80 x 140 cm
Now, to my new painting Super-Earths Discovered
Regular readers will see a continuation with other recent galactic-type paintings. They will also identify my 'play' with landscape and my attempts to untether ideas of 'landscape' from being Earth-bound. New perspectives, revealed by astronomical discoveries, open us to possibilities and potentials that push perspective beyond horizons previously thought to be at the extreme of distance.
They also afford us new ways of viewing ourselves...don't you think? As I have written before, perspective is both literal and metaphoric.
In my painting Super-Earths Discovered a mountainous landscape is shadowed by a massive 'planet'. The orientating mountainous landscape, whilst Earth-like, may not be Earth. It may be one of the newly discovered Super-Earths! Where is the viewer ie: you and me? We may be on the third planet, or in a space craft tripping our way between planets or we may be situated on a neighbouring mountain range gazing across the treacherous landscape. Fun hey!!!
So, alien life is a possibility on these newly discovered Super-Earths. We humans do seem to have a great urge to find 'space mates'. Yet, apart from the possibility of alien life, habitable Super-Earths also offer us alternative 'homes'. You know, when a cataclysmic occurrence, natural or human-made, makes Earth un-inhabitable or non-existent...except as debris [please check out my previous post HOPE]. Let's transport our imaginations into a far distant future...then ten to one hundred times the distance! In order to ensure humanity's survival, what if the 'powers that be' send something, that will ignite human DNA, in a space ship to the most habitable Super-Earth? Imagine that upon landing a mechanism causes the dormant DNA device to trigger life. Ah Ha! But, would we be human like we are now or would we appear more alien-like? There's a story there!
Regular readers will notice the tree...my much loved age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life symbol. The tree signifies...life! In Super-Earths Discovered the tree is like a beacon. Is it welcoming or warning?
I have recently posted some photos of me working...and people seem to really like it. I have had numerous requests for more. To see the previous post please click HERE
So here goes...the following photos are of me painting Super-Earths Discovered
The initial preparation of the stretched linen. Photo: Edwina Fox
Splashing turps around. Photo: Edwina Fox
Waiting to run, dribble and dry. Photo: Edwina Fox
It is a project to send images of life on Earth into space. It's a kind of art installation. The images will be placed in some kind of capsule attached to a satellite which will be launched into orbit around Earth. Will they survive the mainstreet satellite highway up there? If the capsule survives for eons will it stand the heat of our sun in its hades-like dying days? Will aliens discover the images, and if so what will they think? Is the project adding to potential space debris and compromising space sustainability? Is this more about reflecting upon ourselves rather than sending messages afar? Perspective works in wonderful ways!
