PAST AND FUTURE LANDSCAPE

Past and Future Landscape Oil on linen 60 x 110 cm

 

I deliberated for ages trying to think of a title for the new painting above. I finally decided upon Past and Future Landscape. When I was painting it I was thinking about so many aspects of landscape, Earthly and not, and coming up with a title that encapsulated it all was very difficult. But, from previous experience... the simpler the title, the more open ended, less descriptive and didactic it can be. This means the viewer can more easily trip down their own imagination's pathways! So much more satisfying for all.

 

MOUNTAIN RANGES - BUNYA MTS AND CUNNINGHAM'S GAP

The mountain ranges remind me of the Bunya Mts and Cunningham's Gap, both sections of the Great Dividing Range which snakes down the eastern side of Australia. I grew up on my parents grain farm with the Bunya Mts cutting a majestic silhouette against an eastern horizon, whereas the west offered a flat relentless horizon which often disappeared into watery mirages. The contrast between the two horizons intrigued me. [See the flat western horizon in the photo Pirrinuan Siding below. Photography Wilfred Brimblecombe]

 

Cunningham's Gap is a magnificent section of the Great Dividing Range south of the Bunya Mts. I used to drive through the Gap on my way from Brisbane to Goondiwindi, where I lived for 18 years. Each time I approached it from the east my breath was taken away. Glorious shadows cast by the peaks created patterns and shapes that seemed to dance with the sunlight. I stopped many times to sketch these shadows. You can see them in Past and Future Landscape .

 

Yet, the mountains in my painting are not attached to other identifiable landscape elements. They float in an indeterminable space. In fact, there are two mountain ranges, as if mirroring each other. They meet at a point where a tree...my much loved age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life...reveals its canopy of branches and its anchoring roots. A central source of light is identifiable if you look at the shadows cast on the mountains.

 

UNTETHERING LANDSCAPE

I've previously written about my ideas of untethering ideas of 'landscape' from being Earth-bound, to release more cosmic perspectives. I suggest that this is important in an age where cosmological research is revealing more and more about the close and far distances of the Universe...indeed maybe the Multiverse. By untethering 'landscape' we afford ourselves an opportunity to experience multiple perspectives, even simultaneously! How might we view ourselves and our home, planet Earth, then?

 

The tree-of-life in Past and Future Landscape represents all life, past and future. The roots suggest the past and the canopy of branches represents new life, future life. And, life with accompanying consciousness means that 'landscape' is observed. But, now we have an opportunity to take conscious observation beyond Earthly horizons, at the same time as firmly placing Earth within a Universal environment...address even. In doing so we release ourselves to an expanded consciousness that may hold treats we, as yet, can only imagine. But, imagining may be the first step!

 

Without consciousness, after all, there would be no visible universe. Something would exist, but nothing can be said about it. Prof. Joel Primack and Nancy Ellen Abrams, The new Universe and The Human Future: How a shared cosmology could transform the world. Yale University press, new Haven and London, P.76

 

Our relationship with and to landscape somehow mediates and forms our identity and our conscious awareness of ourselves. If we are to become more cosmically aware citizens of the Universe/Multiverse we probably need to see landscape as something more than those within the boundaries of Earth's horizons. This is not to say that we abandon Earth based landscapes. They just become an integral part of a cosmic matrix. By untethering 'landscape' from being Earth-bound, we actually untether ourselves and our awareness. Who knows what we'll discover?

 

 

Pirrinuan Siding Photograph by Wilfred Brimblecombe 1978

Check out more of Wilfred's photographs HERE

______________________________________________________________

 

TATTERSALL'S LANDSCAPE ART AWARD

My painting

Super Earths Discovered

is a finalist!

 

You can view all the finalists by clicking HERE

and you can read about Super Earths Discovered HERE

 

___________________________________________________________________

 

 

COSMIC ADDRESS

 

Is my next solo exhibition

in Brisbane

15-27 October

Please check out  my

 

COSMIC ADDRESS PAGE

 

for all the details!

 

__________________________________________________________

 

 

Here's a link to one previous post where I write about untethered landscape.

UNTETHERED LANDSCAPE

 

 

_____________________________________________________________

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

 

INSPIRATION AND PROCESS

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!

 

 

Woodkid Iron

You can find more about Woodkid HERE

 

 

FAMILY FARM

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.

 

 

Wilfred Brimblecombe   Pirrinuan Paddocks in the 80s

 

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 Beginning of Everything Oil on linen 90 x 180 cm

 

 

PROCESS

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.

 

___________________________________________________________________

 

 

Next Exhibition



 

COSMIC ADDRESS

15- 27 October

Brisbane

 

Check out my recent COSMIC ADDRESS preview notification HERE

 

And to see a painting and post called COSMIC ADDRESS please click HERE

 

 

_____________________________________________________________________

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

 

ON MY TRAVELS I SAW

On My Travels I Saw Oil on linen 90 x 100cm

 

'On my travels I saw'....now where does this lead?

 

 

I wanted to paint an image that reached beyond ideas of literal travel into the vast and intimate distances of imagination. So...'on my travels I saw'...can literally mean seeing something on a journey, but it can also mean conjuring idylls, exploring make-believe, capturing dreams, playing with possibilities, seeking and finding beauty.

 

I also wanted to paint an image that ruffled landscape...earth bound landscapes. I have previously written about my ideas of untethering notions of 'landscape' from Earth, embracing the multitudinous perspectives offered by modern cosmology. So....in On My Travels I Saw there is a landscape, but is it Earth, is it another planet, is it in the past or in the future? The three round and coloured balls are playfully ambiguous. Are they other planets, are they the one planet travelling through time, are they spaceships, are they the whispers from other universes or remnants of the Big Bang? Or, are they moments in a dream, particles of consciousness, inceptions of imagination? I suggest they are all these things and more. It's up to you!

 

 MEETING PLACE OF THE MIND

 

In June 2011 I painted a painting and wrote a BLOG post called Meeting Place of The Mind . Here's a quote from my post:

 

I wanted to create an image which 'spoke' of mind, thinking, intelligence...all in their broadest senses from nano to universal, from human to divine. The trees, figures and the spiral in 'Meeting Place Of The Mind' have an almost synaptic appearance, which I am really pleased about, because it references interconnectedness and the life propelling nature of systems.

 

To read more click HERE

 

 

Meeting Place Of The Mind Oil on linen 100 x 70 cm 2011

 

 

 

OTHER 'TRAVELLING' PAINTINGS

With the help of the tree-of-life

 

 

 Tree-Of-Life Time Travelling Oil on linen 90 x 150 cm 2012

 

 

 Returning Oil on linen 50 x 94 cm 2012

 

 

When It Rained On Mars? oil on linen 90 x 150 cm

 

 

 

MY BROTHER'S LATEST POST AND PHOTOGRAPH

 

Please check out the image.

It is amazing.

Believe me!

 

WILFRED BRIMBLECOMBE BALD ROCK GIRRAWEEN

 

 

THANK-YOU

Thank you to everyone who has been visiting my BLOG. Numbers are steadily increasing and I am most appreciative.

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

TOWARDS A COSMIC LANDSCAPE

This Is A Landscape Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2001

 

 

I was rummaging through my map drawers, where I keep my unframed works on paper, and found this painting [above] This Is A Landscape which I painted in 2001. When I painted it I remember my intention was to be more obvious than obvious, by writing 'This is a landscape' across the entire page. The words give form to the 'landscape' between the tree trunks.

 

Regular readers will know of my interest in untethering notions of landscape from Earth. In 2001 I had not really formulated my ideas, but I remember wanting to disrupt landscape. I wanted to question our complacency towards landscape painting, to unsettle the ubiquitous traditions of landscape, to postulate whether we humans find vulnerable sanctuary within landscape. 

 

When I lived out west, in Goondiwindi, there was an expectation that I'd paint landscapes. This expectation irritated me a bit, because city dwelling artists were not expected to paint cityscapes. Some did and others...most....did not. It seemed such a simplistic attitude. Yet, the 'regional artist' label hung heavy with expectation around my neck. I was angry with landscape!

 

I remember having an exhibition in Brisbane in 1995 or 1995...can't remember the exact date, but my second daughter was still a baby...where the paintings were my early tree-of-life works. Golden Lives [below] was in the exhibition. Back then for me, the tree-of-life was more of a familial tree, rather than the cosmic/universal one I dance with now! The tree, or my motivation to paint it, was about family and connection across generations. Regular readers will know that my ideas were vastly broadened when I exhibited in the Middle East in 2005.  

 

 

Golden Lives Mixed media on paper 1993

 

But back to 1994/5. At the opening of the exhibition a person from a Queensland government Arts organisation kept referring to the trees as gum trees! He was not the only one. I was more than a little irritated! My Goondiwindi address seemed to stick to me like mud!

 

When I moved to Brisbane in 2000 I found there was no expectation to paint landscapes. The irony is that, without the expectation, I began to feel much freer to paint landscapes ...or my versions of them!

 

And now, after years of being immersed in landscape, literally and artistically, I am suggesting we need to untether notions of landscape from being Earth bound, because whilst Earth maybe our home, the Universe is our environment. Looking beyond Earthly horizons provides new and different perspectives, which may reveal new pathways for the future, act as catalysts for co-operation, provide alternative insights...and more.  A cosmic context is really very exciting...new horizons, frontiers and places to explore, at closer and farther distances of space and time. Landscape is no longer 'safe' or expected! I think it is now expectant! And, that's an exciting challenge for us.

 

 

Galactic Horizons and Beyond oil on linen 85 x 150 cm 2012

 

 

 

 

FROM MY BROTHER'S BLOG

'Solo Sunflower'

 

Absolutely beautiful!!!!!!!

 

Solo Sunflower photo taken by Wilfred Brimblecombe

 

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com