aVANT GARDENER
2024 / MONTSALVAT & BALDESSIN STUDIO
Over the last few months I have had the great privilege of painting plein air in the beloved greenhouse of my good friend, ecological artist and Quaker the late Lloyd Godman. It has been really special to be still, paint and feel Lloyd in the space and I hope my homage to him captures some of the beauty he cultivated. Rather than restrict my work to a consistent approach, I gave myself the grace to respond intuitively to the space each day. You can feel the temperature in each of the paintings and their respective colour palettes; dark and moody in the freezing depths of winter, or a light and warm reprieve when the sun comes out. This also allowed me the freedom to explore different languages as I tried to solve the dilemma of how to capture the very intricate and detailed nature of the plants while also grasp the life and potency of the space, a truly living legacy of bromeliads and tillandsia.
Working from life has been a really important discipline for me since engaging more fully with my painting practice over the last few years. When you set up your easel in a landscape or in front of a life model you simply have to paint and respond to what is in front of you. There is no messing around, because that moment—the light, the model’s pose and temperament, the essence—will never be the same again.
Wall text from group exhibition ‘Slow Looking’
Slow Looking - The Art of Working From Life
16 Oct - 10 Nov, Barn Gallery, Montsalvat, Eltham, VIC
Avant Gardener - Solo Exhibition
Baldessin Studio, 10 November - current 2024
Lololand II 2024, oil on board, 22 x 27cm
Lololand I 2024, oil on board, 22 x 27cm
The earth song demands the patience of silence to hear 2024, oil on board, 32 x 42cm $650
Tillandsia growers are totally hooked, there is no return 2024, oil on canvas, 22 x 27cm $450
Epiphytic bromeliads 2024, oil on canvas, 22 x 27cm
Veil (Tillandsia usneoides) 2024, oil on canvas, 42.5cm x 42.5cm
Xeric growth 2024, oil on canvas, 22.5 x 32.5cm, $550
Xeric wall 2024, oil on canvas, 27 x 32.5cm, $550
Urban forest 2024, oil on canvas, 22.5 x 32.5cm, $550
Avant-gardener 2024, oil on canvas, 62 x 78cm $2,200
Lololand I-VI (study) 2024, gouache on paper, various (A4-A5) $150 (sm) $200 (large)
Installation, Lloyd's Greenhouse, Baldessin Studio, 2024
Installation, Lloyd's Greenhouse, Baldessin Studio, 2024
slow looking - the art of working from life
group exhibition, MONTSALVAT / 16 OCT - 10 NOV
Curated by Nicole Bowller
SLOW LOOKING
Slow Looking is a group exhibition exploring the ways in which working from life inspires the artistic practice of six painters and a sculptor. This exhibition brings together a group of artists who engage in the weekly discipline of slow looking and making from the life model. This ritual is also an essential part of fostering artistic friendships and building a sense of community, especially important to artists living on the periphery of a big city.
For many in the group, life drawing/painting is a deviation from their usual practice and gives them the opportunity to deepen their skills of observation, intuition and technique. This practice of working from life has an alchemy that has inspired artists through the ages and keeps them coming back to this weekly routine. Featured in this show are works created together in these sessions.
Each of the local artists—Danni Bryant, Nicole Bowller, David Boyle, Von Davenport, Stephanie Mortlock, Ian Steele and Mark Wotherspoon—also engage in slow looking and making in their work outside of the group. In this exhibition each artist is also presenting a small body of work engaging in this way of looking across the different genres of plein air landscape, still life, or portraiture.
For the painters, the notion of slow looking—slowing down, being present, closely observing detail, colour, light, temperature, texture—is the art of the thinking hand, one that records one’s experiences filtered through all of the senses. Slow looking is also active looking. The artist must ‘see’ in a different way and consciously, or unconsciously, decide—what interests me here? What am I including, or excluding? There is an openness and curiosity to look at something as if for the first time.
For the ceramicist, and one of the life models, Danni Bryant, the theme is even deeper. Not only does the act of modeling bring a stillness and meditative exchange of energy that respectful slowing looking enables, she is also invigorated and inspired to contemplate her own artistic practice, one of slow making, a ‘prolonged engagement with the tactility of a medium and technique’.
WORKING FROM THE MODEL
As part of a larger group we meet weekly at The Dunmoochin Foundation, Cottles Bridge, to work directly from a life model on a long form pose which can range from three hours on a single night or a longer pose over several weeks. It is a practice that gives us the opportunity to deepen our skills of observation, patience and intuition.
It has been our privilege to meet and work with the vibrant and professional community of life models from across Melbourne who share a dedication to artistic collaboration. To paint from the model requires a trust and respect. This way of working implies a reciprocity, a subtle exchange of energy between the model and artist. Unlike a photograph, a painting from life captures time and a model’s essence in a completely different way—multiple moments, feelings and realities are present and caught in an intangilbe way in the work.
As beautifully articulated by one of our models and artist Michaela Meadow (who also runs the weekly life drawing sessions at The Grace Darling @missmusedraw), life drawing ‘forces you to get out of your head, to look, respond and draw what you see, rather than draw the preconceived ideas of what a body should be. The body is a landscape, an organic shape and element that responds to everything around it. As a model myself I want to be in active participation with the creative process’.
Every week it is absolutely fascinating to look around and see what each model brings to the room, and of course, what each artist brings to the work, how do we each ‘see’ the same model. This display of work shows a diverse range of approaches to perennial challenge—how to capture a complex human experience in two dimensions?
With thanks to our models - @shapes.of.kate @michaela.artmuse @wombynude @stefan.sits.still @dannibryant_artist @balcon_e_life_model @rosey.pose.y, @rahme.lifemodel Adam, Sonia, Sherm and Bridie.
WALL TEXT BY CURATOR NICOLE BOWLLER