BRISBANE ISO-STUDIO

My Mum gave me my easel a long time ago.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, isolation has meant I spend most days in my studio. As a painter, I am used to working alone, I am just not used to having day after day free of disruptions. At a time when the world is in a state of flux, fear and anguish, I feel lucky to have such an absorbing occupation.

When I am not in my studio I am at my office desk, writing; all kinds of writing - posts, grant applications, articles, proposals, emails. Oh, and yes - social media.

My studio is actually my garage. I paint with the garage doors up, mainly to disperse turpentine smells. However, I can see a lovely park across the road, and I can hear cyclists as they speed by. Snippets of conversations, shouted from cyclist to cyclist, sometimes intrigue me. Like when I hear bits about business deals, family antagonisms, holiday reports, problems with children or parents. It's all so tantalising. I often wonder about further details.

Of particular delight are the families out walking or cycling. And, the young children skate boarding up and down the street. I've even had people wave to me from the footpath, one couple asking if they could see what I was painting. And, a grandmother with two small children, totally unaware that I was nearby, having a long discussion about flowers in my front garden.

Isolation, for me, isn't necessarily isolating.

At the moment I am working on another new painting. And, yes it is another dronescape, a reflection on the accelerating use of drones for a plethora of reasons. I am thinking of calling the painting Drone Show. You'll get to see it soon.

I also have a self-portrait, which I am really very happy about. I am not sure when I will show it to you though. Keeping it up my sleeve for something!!!

In the meantime, here are some studio photos.

                                                            Working on Echoes Across Time

I often cut out shapes in paper to stick on my paintings, to work out how something might look. I ended up not painting an upside-down tree-of-life in Echoes Across Time.

Various resources - cut-outs, print-outs,scissors, containers, oil and coffee!

Cut-outs on the floor and me sitting to paint low down on the canvas.

Cheers,

Kathryn

ON THE EDGE OF FURY: A LANDSCAPE FOR OUR TIME

On The Edge of Fury: A Landscape for Our Time Oil on linen 30 x 40 cm 2020

PROCESS

On The Edge of Fury: A Landscape for Our Time just happened! I am actually working on another painting Machine Unreadable, nearly completed. I started to prepare a new canvas so that it would be ready to work on next week. But, I could not stop - and - On The Edge of Fury: A Landscape for Our Time is the result. This type of thing happens reasonably often, especially when there is a lot to think about. And, at the moment, with COVID-19, there is a huge amount to think about - and worry about. This kind of rapid creation also happens when I've worked intensively for some time. It's like a release valve. I consider it a normal part of the creative process, a kind of waxing and waning of intensity. 

TURMOIL - VIRUS

I wanted to create an image of turmoil, to reflect the effects of a world changed by virus. As I was pushing the paint around with a brush, pouring paint from a container and tipping the stretcher up and down to make the paint drip and flow, I suddenly thought of my childhood landscape. I've written about this landscape before [please see images below for links]. I grew up on my parent's grain farm on the flat naturally treeless black-soil Pirrinuan Plain, outside Dalby, on the fertile Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. As we danced with endless horizons and relentless skies, distance consumed us. In stormy weather the sky seemed to overtake the landscape. With nothing to obstruct our view we could see where lightning struck the Earth, we could watch clouds rolling wildly and strips of rain pouring on parched soil many kilometers away. The unobstructed flat horizon and the unfolding distance revealed everything. 

HORIZONS

As I was playing with the paint, I suddenly painted a horizontal line across the painting. This is the flat horizon of my childhood, the marker of distance that made me who I am. The painting felt right, it spoke to me about how landscape informs us, if we a willing to watch, listen, smell and feel. With my painting, a tension between calmness and calamity offered a way to think about the effects of the virus. The flat foreground could, on the one hand, be a future of calm reflection about much needed societal change, but, on the other hand, it could also be the past. It's certainly not the present! The sky tumbles uncontrolled, maybe not only reflecting the present, but also a possible future. The flat horizon seems to suggest we have a choice about how this future might expand before us. 

The tension between land and sky is exposed in the nakedness of the flat landscape terrain - no hills, no trees, no houses. The storm, a metaphor, appears ominously ready to devour the calmness. Would this mean a future foreclosed? However, the storm is equally exposed, its fury obviously raw and hot. The flat exposed horizon demands attention, possibly offering hope as it holds the fury back, giving us some time. The horizon is a metaphor for the world to meet the fury of nature in honest and compassionate ways. Are we brave enough? I think we need to be.

Life depends on it.

Cheers,

Kahryn

*Below are some images of the Pirrinuan Plain, plus three other stormy paintings!

Me with my brothers Wilfred and Douglas, many years ago. The sky is stormy, although not wildly so. We had some very welcome rain.

 Me in 2015 on a trip back to Dalby and the Pirrinuan Plain. Note the flat horizon, and the rich black soil. Cotton, mainly dryland, is now farmed in the district. It was not a crop grown during my childhood. Back then it was mainly wheat, corn, sorghum.

A very old photo of the Pirrinuan Plain. Probably taken in the 1930s-1940s by my grandfather.

 Night Time Electrical Storm [Across the Flat Plain] Oil on linen 55 x 80 cm 2012

Stormy Weather, Where? Oil on linen 120 x 150 cm 2013

Storm Oil on linen 85 x 150 cm 2012

RETURNING TO THE COUNTRY - "COSMOLOGICAL LANDSCAPES" - EXHIBITION IN MILES

Australian Landscape Cutout Oil on linen 50 x 70 cm 2015

My exhibition Cosmological Landscapes opened two night ago at Dogwood Crossing, Miles, Western Queensland, Australia. My exhibition hangs in the John Mullins Memorial Art Gallery. It is a great gallery space, kitted out to meet regional gallery standards eg: climate control, lighting, hanging systems, loading bays etc etc. Plus, the professional staff are wonderful to work with. And, the Miles community provides a team of well trained volunteers.

This is my first show for nearly three years. The reason for this is that I became a recluse while I was studying and researching for my Master of Philosophy, University of Queensland. My proposal for Cosmological Landscapes was accepted two and half years ago - and - now it is hanging. 

I relished the opportunity to exhibit paintings completed over the last 3-4 years, including some of my very recent paintings that depict airborne weaponised drones, or indications of their presence. Considering that my interest, and subsequent academic research into militarised technology, was spurred by my creative practice, Cosmological Landscapes provides insight into my journey - from a broad interest in existential risk posed by emerging technologies to a specific focus on contemporary militarised technology. This journey is also a 'flight' through the cosmos, where the vastness of my childhood landscape enticed me to wonder about life and the universe. 

The title Cosmological Landscapes invites the viewer to see 'landscape' as something that traverses universal time and scale - from the quantum to the vast. As this was the first opportunity for me to exhibit some of my dronescape paintings, it was interesting to see how my ideas of 'droned landscape' worked with my earlier paintings. In contextualising the dronescapes as landscapes, the exhibition reveals how landscape is mediated by persistent technological surveillance and the enabling invisible signals that ricochet around the world from node to node - satellites, drones, devices, cars, mobile phones and so on. In my artist's talk I suggested that this insidious mediation affects how we might operate and live in the landscape/environment. In Australian regional and rural centres, for example, satellites are used to monitor/record various aspects of agricultural production and activity - planting, clearing, stock movements, fire break construction and maintenance etc. As this kind of monitoring and surveillance becomes more ubiquitous, human behaviour is likely to change. Extreme examples of places where lives are changed by persistent vertical surveillance are Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia and others. 

 Exhibition image Cosmological Landscapes

 The Australia corner of Cosmological Landscapes

I am so so happy to have an opportunity to exhibit a selection of my Australia paintings. Underground Currency [far left] depicts the continent of Australia, formed by a cascading tree-of-life. The Great Artesian Basin in painted with small blue $ signs. I 'play' with the term currency in multiple ways! This painting was received very well at the opening - country people 'get' the issues surrounding water and the Great Artesian Basin

Me gesticulating during my artist's talk at the opening of Cosmological Landscapes

Photo: Courtesy of Dogwood Crossing

A selection of my dronescapes at Cosmological Landscapes

Cosmological Landscapes

Cosmological Landscapes

                                                               Cosmological Landscapes

                                        Cosmological Landscapes continues until May 21.

On at the same time as Cosmological Landscapes is The View From Here: An Exhibition of Papercuts. Lead artist on this project is Pamela See.

COUNTRY TRIP

A great trip to the country from Brisbane would be - Toowoomba, Dalby, to Jimbour, cut across to Chinchilla, to MILES [to see my show, and The View From Here!], then to Roma, and to Mitchell where the best scrambled eggs can be eaten at the local bakery. Plus, Mitchell has a wonderful spa complex - yes water straight from the great Artesian Basin!

Cheers, Kathryn

SHOWING THEM OUR HOME

Showing Them Our Home Oil on linen 30 x 56 cm 2017

Here's me with my three daughters. They are all adults now. We hover in space as we gaze upon Earth - a pale blue dot - home. 

An experience with perspective - temporal, spatial, metaphoric.

Looking back upon my role as a parent, there are many things I consider important. One is that as a significant adult in a young person's life, whether parent or other, the role of introducing them to the world, our Earthly home and universal environment, is up there on top of the list. One could say that birth is an introduction to the world, and yes it is, but as time goes by, the world is a continuously unfolding mystery. 

There are many ways to introduce someone to broader terrains and ideas. For me, engaging perspective - literal and metaphoric - transcends distance, and in doing so, imagination and compassion are ignited. In catapulting a person from one point of view to another, the world and oneself, dances the rhythm...one minute up close, the next flung to a distance - at one instant close enough to feel breath, the next flung so far away that features disappear - exposing a much bigger picture.      

Polymath Grandmother

My maternal grandmother D. E Ross - a polymath - knew the constellations and planets. She would take me and my two younger brothers out into dark nights, to show us various celestial entities. In Western Queensland there was no light pollution, thus our night skies were [and are] truly wondrous. As a child I was interested in my grandmother's impromptu lessons, but as an adult I look back and recognise a special introduction to the world, our universal one. I wonder if my interest in far horizons and cosmic perspectives was spurred by my grandmother's urgings to look up and wonder.

One of my daughters  has shown a keen interest in space, the outer-space kind of space. She has attended one of the International Space University's Summer programs, held in Adelaide, at the University of South Australia. As a law graduate, she has interests in how current and future legal frameworks will cope with issues such as mining on other planets/moons, space travel and so on. Her impetus comes from a concern for humanity, but also the environment beyond Earth. Maybe discussions about my cosmic paintings, and the things that influenced them, worked their way into my daughter's consciousness? An introduction to 'our world', the universal one, via art!

Another daughter relishes creativity. With her keen and divergent intellect she comes up with amazing and quirky ideas that shift other people's perspectives of our world, whether its our immediate home or the world 'out there'. And, another daughter literally dances her way into and around space ie: our earthly environment. Her energy somehow channeling  other-worldly forces. 

OUR - our

When I showed my daughters Showing Them Our World  they all understood it. The 'our' in the title is not only about us as a family, but all of humanity - the collective OUR. This latter sentiment is truly conveyed by Carl Sagan's words in his book Pale Blue Dot (1994). I have a number of pale blue dot paintings - inspired by perspective, Sagan's words and the famous photograph taken by Voyager 1 as it started its exit from the solar system in February 1990. I recently wrote a post about a few of my pale blue dot paintings. You can read more at this link Pale Blue Dot - Planet Earth 

It is unanimous - all four of us - this painting is never for sale. 

Cheers,

Kathryn

QUEENSLAND LANDSCAPE (UNREAL)

Queensland Landscape (Unreal) Oil on linen 50 x 90 cm 2017

NEWS

On Friday I graduated with a Master of Philosophy (M. Phil) from the University of Queensland. It was a very exciting and fulfilling day. There are a couple of photos below. 

My thesis title was Drones and Night Vision: Militarised Technology in Paintings by George Gittoes and Jon Cattapan. 

Many thanks to my rigorous and wonderful supervisors, Dr. Fiona Nicoll [before she left for Alberta Uni], Dr.Amelia Barikin and Dr. Paolo Magagnoli. The two external examiner reports were returned within two weeks of thesis submission with no requests for corrections or changes. But, with a topic that involved research into the paintings and practices of such thought provoking artists as Gittoes and Cattapan, AND research into drones, autonomous weapons and ubiquitous surveillance, how could anyone lose interest!

I deliberately chose to undertake cross-disciplinary research because, at the end of the day, I wanted the research to trigger inspirations for my own creative practice. The research into militarised technology came from my longer term interest in existential risk posed by emerging technologies. But, especially for an M. Phil, I had to narrow the topic down. I am really happy with how my focus on the legal, ethical, cultural and technical aspects of airborne weaponisable drones, ubiquitous surveillance and burgeoning developments in autonomous weapon systems has provided informed inspiration for my recent paintings. So, onto the next stage....lots of painting and a possible book, based on my thesis.

At the University of Queensland, St. Lucia campus.

At the University of Queensland, St. Lucia campus. In the Great Court.

QUEENSLAND LANDSCAPE (UNREAL)

Queensland Landscape (Unreal) (top) is spoof-ish. It is a landscape, but is it a real one? Or is it an unreal one?

It was inspired by my rural Queensland childhood landscape. To the East of our farm, in the middle of flat treeless Pirrinuan Plain, the Bunya Mountain range cut a majestic silhouette against the seemingly endless sky. Thus, the mountain silhouette in Queensland Landscape (Unreal) could be the Bunya Mountains, which is, in fact, part of the Great Dividing Range that runs down the East coast of Australia. 

But, the orange-red background and the almost fluorescent green appear unnatural. Is the  image a simulation, a fake environment? But, I have painted it - it is not a digitally produced simulation. Can a painting be a simulation in the 21st cyber-century? Can a painting, be a simulation of a simulation, a double entendre play with mimicry without algorithmic assistance? 

I have painted landscapes for decades. So, with a long history of painting landscapes, is  Queensland Landscape (Unreal) an amalgam of many images, if not all? Here, I take a different turn and ponder how generative software is capable of producing many design iterations from provided parameters and sources. Also, bots [internet robots] that can generate fake news, images and online engagement, because they can access mind blowing amounts of data to use, manipulate and appropriate. But, is this similar to engaging memory for the creation of an image? Queensland Landscape (Unreal) speaks to the way my memories, perhaps a source of data and parameters, have created a landscape that could be real and unreal. I lived with the Bunya Mountain silhouette until early adulthood. My childhood landscape of flat treeless plains, distant mountains and huge skies, is part of who I am. In my 20s and 30s I lived in another rural Queensland landscape, further west, beyond my childhood home. There were more trees, a few hills, but massive skies and hazy flat horizons still dominated.

But, to say my memories are data, reduces the impact of how those memories are formed and indeed remembered. I say this because it is not just about me 'downloading' visual memories. It is also about feelings, reminders of heat and dust in Summer, and frost and cold winds in Winter. It's about storm clouds rolling in, and heavy rain obscuring landscape features. Its about my parents ricocheting from worry about no rain, to worries about destructive floods. It's about memories of playing in mud, or watching snakes disappear into cracks when the black soil was starved of moisture. It's about my two younger brothers and I walking out to the main road to catch the school bus. We walked easterly towards the Bunya Mountains. Sometimes we talked, sometimes were fought! It's about the big boys on the bus shouting things out the window to me as I ran to catch the bus - I was often late. It's about going up to the Bunya Mountains for family picnics. We relished the lush green, the rainforest, the waterfall  and the different animals and birds. We were aware of the important Aboriginal connection to the Bunya Mountains. We knew it was a very significant meeting place for Aboriginal people and respected that.    

Queensland Landscape (Unreal) encapsulates all my memories and much more, some I may not be even aware of. It holds secrets behind its spoof of computer generated, bot manipulated unreal-ness. Maybe it is a cosmic landscape - regular readers will know where that idea comes from!

Me with my parents-on a tractor-the Pirrinuan Plain, Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. 

Early 1960s.

Me in 2014 on a visit to my childhood landscape. I am positioned against the western horizon. In the opposite direction the Bunya Mountains cut their majestic silhouette against, as you can see, the endless sky. 

Cheers,

Kathryn

AN INVITATION TO FLY

An Invitation to Fly  Oil on linen 40 x 50 cm 

When I was a child I flew! Yes, I did. 

Somehow, I knew what my parent's farm looked like from above. This was without flying over it in a plane. Also, the farm was on a flat treeless plain, so there were no hills to gaze down upon my childhood landscape. Although my Mum grew a beautiful garden on the flat plain, there were no really tall trees to climb high enough to gain an aerial view. My Father's HAM Radio aerial was probably the tallest thing on the farm - and - it was far too difficult to climb, especially to the top!

I flew!

How I flew I am not sure, but certainly my imagination had a part to play. And, it continues.

Over the years my paintings give testimony to an ability to 'transport' myself above and beyond a landscape, local and planetary! The aerial perspective is one of the common themes that runs through my work. So, it is not hard to understand why I am interested in cosmology, the scientific study of the universe across all temporal and spatial scales. Additionally, my interest in airborne militarised drones and their increasingly autonomous capabilities can be contextualised into themes of aerial perspective. However, I try to elevate myself beyond the reach of the drone to turn the gaze back onto it - in fact - to roam around the drone - above, below, beside it - taking cosmological perspectives. By doing this, I invite the viewer to also play around with perspectives. [Please browse through other posts to see more of my 'dronescapes'].

An Invitation to Fly recalls my childhood daydreams and imaginings. Relentless blue skies, occasionally dotted with white fluffy clouds, seemed to invite me to fly. The flat western horizon often shimmered with mirages that melted land and sky into oneness. This certainly helped to generate a feeling of being aloft, as if the ground had slipped away, leaving me hovering. 

An aerial perspective, even a cosmic one, though, can help us orient the way we perceive threats to our planetary environment and the plants and creatures that inhabit it. These creatures include us human beings. As Carl Sagan's commentary on the famous "Pale Blue Dot" photograph notes, for the current moment there is nowhere else for us to call 'home'*. Sustainable interplanetary squatting by humans is some time away! More specifically the increasing colonisation of the skies by surveillance and lethally equipped drone weaponry disrupts perspective by creating a layer of threat that impedes access to cosmic perspectives, even imagining them. If the sky is 'falling in', as it metaphorically does in conflict places such as Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, it is an indictment on us all - especially in an age where astronomers and cosmologists are discovering more about our universal environment - which may actually be a multiversal one. 

An Invitation to Fly could be an invitation to you. It could be my childhood memory. But, maybe we are already flying and we are gazing down upon Earth - is it actually Earth? Or. are we on Earth gazing upwards, about to take off? 



* My painting and post Pale Blue Dot 

SENSORED

Sensored oil on linen 50 x 50 cm 2017

We humans are increasingly 'sensored' beings. By this, I mean, we are equipped with, attached to or carrying devices that are operated by digital and cyber systems that interconnect across skies, land, seas and space. They interconnect using even more devices such as satellites, land-based receivers, servers and more. 

The devices we interact with, whether a phone, a car, a computer, an implant or other - 'sensorise' us. They make us a part of, or even a node in, cyber and digital networking systems. And - in a funny way, they also censor/ise us, but maybe we have not fully comprehended this yet? 

Transhuman - Translandscape

As our bodies carry devices in ways that transform us into transhuman-like creatures, they also transform the way our landscape or environment operates or is viewed. For example, skies 'colonised' by unmanned weaponised airborne drones change the way the sky is perceived. This is particularly so in places such as Yeman, Somalia and Afghanistan where the skies are seen by many as harbouring a potential lethality. In these cases the landscape becomes vulnerable, offering little refuge when vertical surveillance penetrates even the privacy of everyday life. A landscape crisscrossed with humans carrying and using devices, and buildings equipped with even more, develops another layer - not geographic - but, an unseen layer of signals. These signals variously traverse the globe, bounce from earth to satellites and back again. A 'translandscape' possibly? Another recent painting and post Space Net refers to this kind of activity. 

Sensored

In Sensored red 'signals' emanate from behind a cloud. What lurks behind this cloud? A drone maybe? The red signals continue beyond the painting. They indicate a wide net, a net of surveillance. In doing so, they reveal how the sky is now 'sensored' in a way that is not dissimilar to the 'sensorising' of human beings. It's an insidious process - don't you think? 

Like many of my paintings - dronescapes, landscapes. cosmic landscapes - the viewer could be above the clouds looking down upon a landscape, maybe a seascape. In this case a drone is possibly lurking below the clouds. However, the viewer could also be on the ground looking up into the sky where a drone could potentially be lurking above the clouds. With these two possible perspectives the painting somehow provides a powerful stimulus for imaginative flying around a drone - in ways that turn the surveillance back onto it.    

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WESTERN QUEENSLAND 

Now for something a bit different. The photo below is me in the very back of a landcruiser. We've just driven around checking cattle. 

I spent a fabulous weekend out in Western Queensland - Roma, Mitchell and Mungallala. 

An old school friend has a cattle property beyond Mungallala. We had a camp fire, damper, homemade sausages. And, we helped check on cattle, their water [it is very dry]. We saw a brown snake - early for the season. We saw hundreds of kangaroos, both dead an alive. And, emus - so many - all alive! We went to the Mitchell Art Show, the Mitchell Camel and Pig Races, and had a wonderful dip in the Mitchell artesian spa. One of us bought a hat, a country man's hat, from the fabulous Samios Trading Post store in Mitchell. Two people in our group were from Europe and it was so much fun to see country Australia through their eyes. Everything, absolutely everything, was new to them. 

We spent a day in Roma too. Visited Moorelands nursery where you can have a bite to eat amongst an oasis of plants, bush crafts, children playing and more. We also visited the BIG RIG which tells you all about the history of the oil and gas industry out there. This recent history has been somewhat controversial with the increase in coal seam gas exploration. 

Cheers,
Kathryn

CAN THE LEAVES STILL DANCE?

Can The leaves Still Dance? gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2017

A STORY
When my eldest child was about two and a half we were sitting on our verandah which looked over a creek. This S. E Queensland [Australia] rural setting was complete with grassy fields, cattle grazing and gum trees lining the creek banks. A faint breeze was stirring. My toddler turned to me and said "Look Mummy the leaves are dancing". The leaves were rustling in the breeze, and the sharp eyes of a two year old noticed. I will never forget this moment for a number of reasons.

I was thinking about dancing leaves when I painted Can The leaves Still Dance? 

21st CENTURY
In an age where environmental issues plague us, and droughts cause mass migrations of people, even if trees have leaves - would people notice them dancing in a breeze? In an age where we are glued to our digital devices, do we look up and around to notice leaves dancing in a breeze? In an age where cities are congested, as we traverse busy streets, sip coffee in trendy cafes and work in interior designed offices, do we notice any trees, let alone their dancing leaves? 

In the 21st century, the age of simulation, drones, surveillance and monitoring, can we still appreciate leaves dancing as a breeze rustles through a tree's branches? What if we took 'dancing leaves' and 'breeze' as co-metaphors for life transmitted symbolically in the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life? In  Can The leaves Still Dance? In Can The leaves Still Dance? I've included references to many trees - trees-of-life - some upright and some upside down. 

One tree acts as the figures' shadow. It is a shared shadow, maybe the shadow of all humanity - past, present and future. There are 'rivers' of leaves too. Are they fallen leaves, now dancing to another life tune? Or, maybe they are escaping? In the background radiating lines appear sun-like. But, could they be the surveillance and targeting signals of a hovering drone?

I'm sure you have stories to tell, thoughts to entertain, memories to remember and dreams to dream - so I'll leave you to think some more about Can The Leaves Still Dance? 

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This is another of my cosmic landscapes. Also, a dronescape. Interesting, though, that country Queensland is still there - launched to other realms of the universe!

Cheers,
Kathryn.
Please follow me on Instagram to see more images of paintings, studio shots etc. 

THROUGH THE MISTS OF TIME

Through the Mists of Time Gouache and watercolour on paper 56 x 75.5 cm 2017

As regular readers know, my recent paintings have been influenced by my M. Phil research into contemporary militarised technology. Recent work has featured the figure of the unmanned air vehicle, commonly called the drone, often in juxtaposition with my interpretation of the age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life symbol. 

However...

This new painting Through the Mists of Time does not feature a drone. Rather, it focuses on humanity - unplugged from all cyber and digital technologies.

A result of my research focusing on contemporary militarised technology, is a counter balancing re-focus on questions associated with what it means to be human in the 21st century. That's why the tree-of-life figures so strongly in my work, with or without drones! The tree, as an age-old transcultural/religious symbol 'speaks' of all life and its systems. 

In Through the Mists of Time I wanted to place humanity, as represented by the male and female figures, in a cosmic seemingly timeless landscape. The figures seem to 'cast' a tree-of-life shadow, or new root system, at the same time as they project a tree-of-life into the sky - the endless future. A 'stream' of leaves gives the impression of time passing, the white oval shape alludes to renewal and birth, while the small round tree hovers like a fire fly, ready to illuminate, play, guide, tease. Small dots make up various parts of the painting - are they stars, new universes, energy particles, past and future histories? 

I am interested in investigating human agency in an age where unseen algorithms influence so much of our lives. I suggest that in an age of increasing automation, and developments in robotics and artificial intelligence, questions about human agency are important.

POEM

I was a fare way into completing this painting - and it did take some time - when I decided to re-read some of my Mother's and Grandmother's poems in their joint anthology Out There (1986). Well, one of my Mother's poems 'sang' to my new painting. In fact, I took its title from a line of my Mother's poem. The poem is:

Grafting Time

by Elsie Brimblecombe 

Published in Out There by D. E Ross [my grandmother] and Elsie Brimblecombe, Elise Publishing, Dalby, 1986.

If I squeeze the golden fruits

Of time, and suck the juice

Till from the leathered skins

The pith and core and rind

   fall free

The seed beyond the centre

Of that fruit will score

Their mark and drop

Beyond the pearly orchard gates

   and grow

There is this land crossed by days

And falling within the season's drop

Those fruits will bear

Upon the hour, the stop

And go of earth's frantic measure

But if I could graft the trees

Of time and from that union

Spring a growing season

Rooted in the current flow

I would grow and tree of life

   beyond record

A tree whose branches spread

Beyond our lives and those gone by

A tree which blossomed

Through the mists of time

And set its fruits to ripen

In the thinking of the wise.

______________________________

Please check out recent and older posts for more on my work figuring the drone, the tree-of-life and cosmic landscapes.

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

REGROWTH + DRONE STAR

Regrowth Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

NEWS

I am very happy to report that my entry Where There's Life There's... is a finalist in the $15,000 Redland Art Award. This award is biennial. You can read more about it and see the list of finalists etc HERE I shall keep you up to date - winner announced 14 October. 

And, at the bottom of this post I have news about the Tattersall's Landscape Art Prize. 

REGROWTH + DRONE STAR

As you can see I am still fixated on the figure of the drone - the drone in the landscape to be more precise. Both Regrowth and Drone Star  depict a drone with emanating signals that create a star-like appearance. These signals are representative of a drone's sensors which receive and transmit data. 

In Regrowth the drone's signals contrast with the emanating branches of the tree-of-life.  This age-old transcultural/religious symbol is the drone's target - for data and perhaps attack. The red box - kill box- around the lone tree indicates that it is a target. Yet, the tree defies the intrusion by sending down new roots. In my mind it acts subversively, but then again, having seen Australian bush regrowth, I know that where and when it can, life re-emerges. 

Drone Star plays with the viewer's sense of orientation. Are you above the drone looking down onto the ground or are you below the drone looking up to a sky. In either case the drone's signals have taken over, hijacked even, the landscape - skyscape. The vibrant colours act as a kind of camouflage sending a message of benign, or even fun, intent. But, is this really the case? 

As regular readers know, I have a delight in playing with perspective and orientation. The drone is giving me ample inspiration in so many ways. 

Here are links to some more of my recent DRONE paintings:

DRONESCAPES

DRONE EXHAUST 

STRATEGIC LANDSCAPE - DRONED

DATA DATA - SKY OF EYES

DRONE LIFE SHADOW PLAY

Drone Star Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

TATTERSALLS'S LANDSCAPE ART AWARD UPDATE

And, here's the news on the Tattersall's $30,000 Landscape Art Prize. The winner was announced on Wednesday last week. AND, congratulations to Ann Thomson for her win with Breakwater. Highly Commended to Melissa Egan and Guy Warren, Commended to Margaret Loy Pula and Members' Choice Award to Michael McWilliams. The exhibition will continue from 12 September to 23 September at the Riverside Centre, 123 Eagle St, Brisbane. 

My entry Privileged Landscape? [below] received some great comments from people at the opening. 

 Privileged Landscape oil on linen 80 x 140 cm 2015

10 THINGS FOR 10 YEARS - BLOGGING ANNIVERSARY 2006 - 2016

 Scoping The Abyss Gouache on paper 19 x 22 cm 2016

CUE
Taking a cue from social media sites where headlines grab attention I've decided to channel the grab-line! Maybe not as successfully as most media sites, and thankfully for good reason.  I don't think "10 Things You Did Not Know About Kathryn" is really going to grab attention or "10 Things Kathryn Keeps Secret" or "Kathryn's Most Irritating 10 Habits: According To Her Children".

However, to tickle my own humour I decided that I'd list 10 things that interest, irk, inspire me. They are all related to my art practice either closely or tangentially. And, it helps me celebrate my 10th year blogging - posting consistently once a week August 2006 - August 2016!

SCOPING THE ABYSS
But, before I go onto my list. Why did I choose the painting above Scoping The Abyss? 

The drone's scoping devices seek out the abyss where insurgency and terror lies, but I wonder if the scoping actually creates the abyss? Moving away from the military connotation let's think of the painting another way. The ubiquitous nature of connectivity, via an array of devices enable monitoring, surveillance, data collection, data retention and targeting. This creates a virtual abyss where, for example, misleading headlines about celebrities, politicians, events etc throw us into an abyss of superficiality and vacuous diversion. The result is a kind of inertia - maybe an abyss in itself?

Here's an example of being 'targeted' - I googled Suburu cars - yes daydreaming about a new car - and within minutes Suburu advertisements had appeared on my Facebook page. Helpful - NO. Diversionary - yes for a minute or two. Slightly creepy - YES!

Me with two paintings - I am 14 in this photo.

I exhibited in an adult show when I was 14 and sold my first painting at the exhibition.

10 THINGS FOR 10 YEARS BLOGGING ANNIVERSARY

1. TREE-OF-LIFE
I have been inspired by it for decades and I continue to  see how its symbolic potency intersects with contemporary life. It has meant something across cultures and religions for eons and I propose that we ignore it at our own peril.

Beacon Oil on linen 92 x 102 cm 2014

2. COSMOLOGY 

The scientific study of the universe across time and scale helps me with my fascination with perspective , literal and metaphoric. 

Cosmic Auroboros Oil on linen 120 x 150 cm 2012

This post for this painting is the most popular on my BLOG 

3. TECHNOLOGY AND MILITARISED TECHNOLOGY

My current M. Phil research is focused on militarised technology, an incredibly fascinating but somewhat scary area of technological development. I have a particular interest in drones! You can see this in a few of the paintings in this post and in many of my recent posts. 

New Shoots Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2016

4. LANDSCAPE

I grew up in rural Queensland. How we humans 'see' landscape is, I propose, an important element in how our species might survive this century. I combine the tree-of-life, cosmology, technology and more recently, militarised technology into my landscapes where I experiment with literal and metaphoric perspective. Disrupted Horizon [below] is one example of how I combine my various inspirations. 

Disrupted Horizon Gouache on paper 10.5 x 24.5 cm 2016

5. MY STUDIO

I have two spaces/studios in my house. One is the garage [two photos below] and the other is a funny room that used to house the hot water system. The latter is used for my works on paper and the former for my bigger oil paintings. Both a really messy. I love my studios.

6. PAINTING

I love painting. I have previously sculpted with various mediums [clay, concrete, assemblage]. I have also worked with etching, screen printing and lithography. I have worked in installation including one where video was an integral part of the work. I have had experience with photography as my brother is a keen photographer. As a young teenager he had a dark room in one of the outbuildings on the farm we grew up on. None of these mediums gets my daydreaming, thinking, problem solving like painting does. 

Painting at Kindergarten - a few decades ago!

7. VISUAL ARTS POLICY - This is an irk!

Two policies introduced in 2010 and 2011 by the Australian Labour Government of the time have severely and detrimentally impacted on visual artists' earning abilities, plus the flow on effect to various suppliers and dealers. The LNP Government, since election in 2013, has not addressed either issue. I get on my sopabox about these two things - but won't here. I'll just note what they are. These two policies are: 

• 2011 Changes to the status of art/collectibles as an investment in Self Managed Super Funds. 
• 2010 The introduction of the Artists' Resale Royalty Scheme. 

8. ABU DHABI

My exhibition at the Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation in late 2005 is a highlight of my career. I sat with the exhibition each day over two weeks and met the most amazing people from all over the region, Africa and Eastern Europe. The conversations I had with so many of these people, men and women, have had a profound influence on me. I KNOW that the arts can help create bridges across cultures - BUT unfortunately governments, especially Western ones, often see the arts as a show and tell type exercise or opportunity. I have witnessed this a few times...sadly.

At the opening of my exhibition at the Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation 2005. 

L to R:Clementine Fox,  Mr Khalfan Asst Undersecretary Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation, Hon Rod Welford Queensland Minister for Education and the Arts,  Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox. 

9. PUBLIC SPEAKING

I enjoy public speaking - weird I know.

10. M. PHIL

I am a full-time student at the University of Queensland and loving it - most of the time! I am investigating how two Australian artists George Gittoes and Jon Cattapan represent militarised technology in their paintings. ABSOLUTELY FASCINATING!!! Both artists are remarkable. 

The topic fed from my own work and now the research is feeding back into my work. Also, as I paint I seem to work through some of my academic ideas, which result in new insights. My own work is not part of the degree, but once I have finished the degree I will have a body of work that reflects how it inspired me. 

George Gittoes has an exhibition "Night Vision" here in Brisbane at Mitchell Fine Art Gallery right now - it closes 20 August. If you are in Brisbane you MUST go and see it. It's confronting, but the integrity of the work exudes - George has worked in war and conflict zones for decades and pays witness to the horror of war in multi-layered ways. 

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NEWS

I have again been invited to be a finalist in the Tattersall's Landscape $30,000 Art Award.

I deliver my painting on the 30th August.

The exhibition will be at the Tattersall's Club, Brisbane 5 - 9 September and then it relocates to Riverside Centre 12 - 23 September. 

Cheers,

Kathryn