I started this series almost on a whim. Experiences as children sharply determine who we will be as adults. As we mature, we become better at masking those childhood emotions, we build a stronger exterior to smooth the bumpy ride, but underneath, within us all, is still the little boy or girl, never quite believing where we are and what we’re doing. Continue reading Dry your tears: the child within us #art #collage
I have been having crazy catfish dreams. Literally, I dreamed giant man-sized catfish were swimming the river near our house. The night after, weird pie-faced shape-shifting clowns were chasing me down. And last night, even stranger things too unsettling to speak of. All these dreams have coincided with a burst of creativity and a completely new direction for my art that I hadn’t anticipated at … Continue reading Out of nowhere, something new in #art
There’s effectively just three works in Cai Guo-Qiang’s exhibition at Queensland’s Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA). If you know that, you’ll be enthralled, amazed, overwhelmed. I was left with the feeling of “Is that it?”. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love this gallery, I love their focus on works from the giant neighbours to Australia’s north. And I was thrilled by Cai Guo-Qiang‘s thoughtful … Continue reading Steep price for monumental works: Cai Guo-Qiang, Falling Back to Earth
Art for art’s sake is a beautiful idea – but artists have to eat. Few of us have generous benefactors to lavish funds upon us, so a sale means we can keep going. Selling work means we can buy new art supplies, sales mean we can secure a space in a studio or artist-run-initiative (ARI) and sales mean we can keep doing what we love. … Continue reading SOLD, SOLD. Why sales validate artists.
Sometimes something happens that afterwards you can’t believe was real. Once I saw a man running naked down George Street in Sydney in morning rush hour before disappearing into trees in Hyde Park. Afterwards, I wasn’t sure whether I’d actually seen him as no-one reacted. Last weekend a similar thing happened to me in Castlemaine, a little town of about 8000 people north of Melbourne, … Continue reading Sleepwalking into art at Castlemaine Gallery
Saatchi Online is an enormous gallery that anyone in the world can step into and wander among hundreds of thousands of artworks by artists all around the world. I love the idea but it can be overwhelming, knowing where to start and how to find good artwork. That’s why it’s great when pieces are curated it’s a great way to see solid works in a … Continue reading Inspired by Picasso, an online exhibition curated by Rebecca Wilson
Adelaide is a tricky place to get to, it’s surrounded by desert and is parked in the groin of Australia. I had to head down there for work and was lucky enough to discover some of the most extraordinary gallery curation I have ever seen in my life. Even at revered institutions like the Royal Academy in London and MOMA in New York, I have … Continue reading Extraordinary curation at the Art Gallery of South Australia
I’ve decided to go back to school and learn to draw all over again. After spending 20 years in the mad world of advertising, my drawing skills became institutionalised. They became kind of pictionary-esque quick-draws to get an idea across as quickly and simply as possible. It’s a joy to step back into school, at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra and pick … Continue reading Back to basics, re-learning to draw
When you think about religious art, the first thing that comes to mind for many is little baby Jesus with a golden halo. Not so, when it comes to the Blake Prize which explores the religious and spiritual in art. One year a textured abstract took the $25,000 prize. Another year, a Buddhist entry scooped the prize. I’ve always wanted to enter the Blake but … Continue reading What my teddy bear taught me about idolatry
Last Saturday, bleary-eyed, we got up early and drove for an hour to Canberra in the ute with Trim, our kelpie, in the back to have breakfast at the National Gallery of Australia. Patricia Piccinini’s SkyWhale was being inflated and was about to glide across the capital in a flying sculptural tribute to Canberra’s 100th birthday. We’d been invited to breakfast and I had expected … Continue reading Suddenly I was breakfasting with Patricia Piccinini and Vivien Lovell
Ray Monde 