My work is mostly painting, drawing, mixed media, printmaking and, at times, photography. As the daughter of a cabinetmaker and a creative homemaker, I have always been interested in art and design and making things. After leaving school I originally studied and worked as an Industrial Designer, but soon made my way into Graphic Design jobs and eventually into Tertiary Art and Design teaching. I currently work full time in my Mittagong Studio as a professional artist, exhibiting in Regional NSW and Victoria, and in Melbourne and Sydney.
I often work in series where I have several works happening at the same time. I like to explore one subject or idea by creating as many works as I need before exhausting that idea. I love experimenting and, although this was a good attribute for teaching painting and design, it has also resulted in my portfolio comprising of many directions in my work over the years. I just love making art.
My work ranges from abstract to expressive and impressionistic. Nature's patterns and textures are common themes where I interpret rather than copy my subject. Important landscapes include the desert, the bush and the coast. Unfashionable and untidy are appealing! I enjoy seeking a visual language that interprets, and so describes, the landscape that I experience. I ask of the viewer to "hear" and to "feel" the landscape, as well as "view" it.
The subject of still life is a reliable backstop that I keep returning to. There's always the kitchen, the domestic scene and dead flowers. They are static and always there for me. Portraits and the figure are also of great interest and I regularly participate in the practice of life drawing.
I regularly return to intangible subjects such as sound, noise and silence (what would a sound look like - how can I visually describe it?), smell, taste, touch, unfamiliar language, time, memory and history. In these works, my forever interest in colour theory and design elements keeps leading me to reduce any recognisable image in order to place undeniable emphasis on the emotive content. These works are more “difficult” to view and more challenging to create. There is a delayed reaction in their making, as if they need sort of incubation time to distill a little.
I develop much of my work in the studio referencing my sketches, photos, my written descriptions and thoughts, and, above all, my memory and knowledge.
