WIld Dog Rock
108cm x 126cm
Acrylic on Canvas

‘Wild Dog Rock’ looks at how rugged, energetic and alive a site can be when you consider its place in the past, present and future. This site forms part of the Wild Dog Dreaming of Alice Springs and is a 5-minute walk from the Araluen Precinct towards Larapinta. It deserves environmental and creative attention due to the invasive buffel grass surrounding it, sheltering litter and promoting unhealthy bushfires. Many sites, like Corroboree Rock have been fortunate enough to have both Parks & Wildlife and traditional custodians working together for its preservation.

This is now the second painting of this site, which is uncommon in my practice, but clearly this means it is a place that gives. I love the feeling of loyalty, patience and longevity to a subject when so often your creative endeavor is fickle and forever changing.

Acrylic on Canvas
148cm x 113cm

This site forms part of the Wild Dog Dreaming of Mparntwe and is a 5-minute walk from the Araluen Precinct towards Larapinta. It deserves environmental and creative attention due to the invasive buffel grass surrounding it, sheltering litter and promoting unhealthy bushfires. Many sites, like Corroboree Rock have been fortunate enough to have both Parks & Wildlife and traditional custodians working together for its preservation. I often day-dream about this site and many others like it, prompting me to evoke a sense of euphoria or enchantment. A light & careful application of paint was used to resemble a lively landscape and the care to be taken when bushwalking through areas like this. I’d like to think the Irrkerlantye (Brown Kite) circling the area for food symbolises the presence of a protective figure and a pre-westernised ecosystem.

Corroboree Rock
Acrylic on canvas
1900mm x 1260mm (Dyptich)

Corroboree Rock is one of many sacred sites in Central Australia that has been subject to over tourism. This sacred men’s site holds extreme importance to the traditional owners, which means it needs to be respected from afar to ensure no damage is done and locals can maintain connection to the land. Parks and Wildlife and Traditional Owners have a joint management plan that now allows the area to be protected by law.

Assisting local landcare groups in similar efforts, bushwalking and just getting some sun allows my time in nature to positively impact time in the studio bringing balance in my practice.

Thank you to the Ryder family for the permission to showcase this beautiful area East of Alice Springs.

Acrylic on canvas
1500mm x 1100mm

As soon as lockdown hit, I was commissioned to paint a landscape of Ormiston Gorge. My process usually involves travelling to the area, spending a few hours sketching and photographing the place before heading back to the studio and getting started.

This time I was tasked with working from sketches & several photographs of the place I'd taken a long time ago, as well as photographs online. It was the most challenging landscape to date. It’s not often I paint water in my scapes simply because there’s not enough bodies of water around! Looking forward to doing more of them, now. Glen Helen is a favourite of mine, but still haven’t painted it yet. :O

A landscape painting should reveal an ancient and modern energy that the land provides. A theme I strive to execute well. Isolation and integration are also notable themes of mine also found in this work.

The Jentsch’s Mt. Gillen
Acrylic on Canvas
500mm x 700mm

The inspiration for this commissioned work of Mt. Gillen came straight after the most recent rains in Alice where we saw the ranges go green for that very brief period.

I wanted to use a blend of acrylic and watercolour techniques to brighten the piece up and give it a fun, impressionistic look. By no means is it realistic, but it shows how the locals see these drastic colour changes in the landscape living here.

Spinifex Tracks
Acrylic on canvas
640mm x 460mm

In response and contrast to the last spinifex study, I decided to use a sporadic design instead of an unrealistic constructed one. Looks much more natural. I’m learning a bit about the spinifex ecosystem, how to apply paint to create a sandy texture and minimizing the colour palette to only cobalt blue, red oxide, yellow ochre and titanium white. Keeping it simple and sharp was the aim in nailing the work.

‘Blue Mallee Hill - East MacDonnell Ranges’
Acrylic on Canvas
585mm x 390mm

At the beginning of the Ridgetop walk at Trephina Gorge, walkers are welcomed up the hill by a field of yellow and blue. The young yellow spinifex spikes imitate soft grass and throughout the hill is a stream of regenerating Blue Mallee Gums. The dead, blackened charcoal branches are perfectly contrasted with it’s regeneration of thick, promising blue leaves. On this day there were silky smooth, transparent clouds that were stretching their way across the sky, adding another layer of contrast to the landscape. The entire walk takes 4 hours and although I only completed 1 hour of it, I was treated to so many stunning scenes and felt an incredible amount of inspiration. Stay tuned for more down the track.

Trephina Gorge Bluffs
Acrylic on canvas
600mm x 400mm

This was the view 30 minutes down the track of the Ridgetop walk at Trephina Gorge. The walk and the view gave a lot of clarity on my current thoughts and this is expressed in my blog. There’s a lot going on in this landscape, contrary to the usual approach. It was challenging to balance the sky with the hills, spinifex and red dirt foreground.

‘Cushion Hill - East Macs’
Acrylic on Canvas
560mm x 410mm

I found this area en route to Corroboree Rock along the East MacDonnell Ranges in Alice Springs. It was at the end of a trail, I couldn’t go any further and I looked up. The hill from afar with all it’s spiky spinifex looks soft and inviting. Far from it!! Very dangerous walking through there…
I wanted to catch a feel of the morning winter lighting, so I used cooler tones throughout the work rather than warm to emphasise on it.
It was a great chance to study spinifex for an upcoming work, too.

‘The Guerin’s Gillen’ (Mt Gillen, Alice Springs)
Acrylic on Canvas
450mm x 630mm

‘Buffel grass- Drying out’
Acrylic on Canvas
450mm x 550mm

‘Buffel grass - Post rain movement’
Acrylic on Canvas
450mm x 550mm

‘Heavitree Gap’
Acrylic on board
9 x 5 Inches

The Waverly Woolhara Art School has an annual art prize called the 9 x 5 and I thought why not enter it?! A spontaneous response to the landscape was the brief…

When I drive to work around 6pm, I’m blessed with this beautiful view of the Gap, the only gap in the world that has a highway, railway and river run through it. One night the sky, the grass and ranges were lit up with colour and energy, and this was my response.