Speechless (will Gaia turn us into a tree) Large painting

Speechless (will Gaia turn us into a tree) is based and inspired by the smaller work Silenziosa.
Gaia mother of all life and Greek goddess of Earth as well as the Daphne myth in which she turns into a laurel tree and decides to stay silent were brought to my intention by some viewers which I am grateful for.

This large work began from a mixture of influences and impressions I cumulated during our six months stay in Italy in 2022. The landscape, the Cartasia biennale, the old poetry books I found on the antique markets, the beautiful color of the olive trees, the colorful fields in spring and at the same time my feelings and confrontation with the environment and climate change which is effecting Italy a lot has had a great effect on my work as always. We hadn’t had any rain of significance till the last couple of days of our stay in Terracina an incredible little town on the west coast. It has been a terrible drought for Italy with wild extremes as everywhere in the world. Are we going to take real action or stay silent and just hope for the best. Are we kidding ourselves and should we laugh at ourselves as we look what has been done to bring change about. The goddess of the earth might turn us into a tree if we keep going the way we do now and postponing real action and keep desecrating our beloved Earth.

I used recycled teabag wrappers from organic teas I drank in Italy and pages from old Italian poetry books I bought at the local antique markets for collage, besides a mixture of acrylic paints, pens and pencils.

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‘A work is born from a kind of confused emotion. The work is an attempt to elucidate that emotion.’ Puvis de Chavannes

‘An abstract language that reveals references to an aesthetic figuration with a surreal flavour. This is the art of Marijke Lambregtse, an Australian based contemporary artist of Dutch origin, who focuses her artistic research on the relationship between man and the world, in its most hidden aspects. Her paintings are often characterized by the presence of human-like figures, whose facial features vanish overwhelmed by fields of colour, annihilating gestural communication and leaving the latter in complete control of emotions.

An alternation of more gestural brushstrokes and more detailed and sharply described elements, give the work a pleasant dynamism. Looking at Marijke Lambregtse's paintings, we feel out of place, in awe, as if we have crossed the threshold into another world and we are suddenly strangers. (Francesca Brunello)

Her recent abstract figurative works arise from a growing eco-anxiety and a critical concern for the state of the world today. Shaped by direct encounters with climate change, pollution, displacement, and environmental injustice, the work responds to systems that prioritise profit, control, and exploitation over care and coexistence. She seeks to harmoniously merge message and aesthetics, using emotionally charged strikingly colorful, acrylic paint, recycled materials, text, and texture to confront viewers with both beauty and unease.

A professional dancer, teacher and choreographer before crossing over to studying visual art and gaining a BVA majoring in sculpture at Griffith University in Brisbane she was awarded the Karl and Gertrude Langer Award which resulted in a solo exhibition at the Brisbane Town Hall gallery.

Since then she has been exhibiting regularly with several solo exhibitions, being a finalist in numerous art awards and has been widely collected in Australia and overseas.

Brunswick Street Gallery Small Works Art Prize 2026
Lethbridge 2025 Small Scale Art Prize salon finalist
Finalist Abstraction Exhibition Petrie Terrace Gallery 2025/2024
Finalist in Lethbridge 2024/2023 Small Scale Art Awards Salon de Refusés
Finalist in the Brisbane Rotary Art Show 2024/2023
Finalist in the Brisbane Portrait Prize Salon des Refugees 2022
Finalist in the RQAS annual Exhibition 2023
Finalist in the Amore exhibition at Artprenr Gallery 2023
Finalist in the Queensland Figurative 2022
Finalist in the Lethbridge 20000 Small Scale Art Award in 2022, 21, 20 and 2019
Awarded the Power of Creativity Art Prize by Contemporary Curator Art Magazine in 2021
Highly Commended in the Abstraction Exhibition Royal Queensland Art Society 2021
Finalist in the Rotary Spectacular Brisbane in 2019 and 2018