Artists capture history and life
A SOLO exhibition that explores an iconic rural structure, a group show that uses textiles to express diverse interests, and a selection of work forming a travelling quilters exhibition are all part of a series of regional displays.
The Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery is hosting exhibitions that explore the illusion of space and texture as well as the tactile reality of three-dimensional textile works.
The lower gallery space is presenting Nundubbermere, a series of watercolour paintings by Lismore-based artist, Christine Porter.
The artist is well known as a visual historian through her accurate depictions of shearing sheds and other rural buildings.
The shed at Nundubbermere, the second property to be registered in Queensland after the Leslie brothers recorded their claim in Warwick, is an iconic architectural entity.
With original sections dating back to the 1860s, the building has been added to, modified, and adapted to changing needs and modern technology.
Porter has captured the evolving architecture, the gates, rails, and the expanses of floorboards disappearing towards distant walls.
The medium of watercolour is skilfully and lovingly handled. The subjects are caressed with a gentle touch that imbues a sense of history: the sepia tones suggest a patina of age wrapped in memories.
Light through doorways shapes looming wool bales and defines the geometrical patterns of rafters.
Perhaps even more eloquent are Porter’s small paintings of a length of chain, oil cans, a first aid kit.
But it is the pages from her sketchbooks that provide the essential bones, these, and the plentiful didactic texts, create an articulate framework that shares thought processes, decisions of composition, artistic vision, and the artist’s fascination with her subject.
The second floor of the gallery is showing the poetically titled exhibition, Falling with Wings, the work of the Warwick Textile Creatives.
Following the theory that by falling, birds learn to fly, the
artists have tried to embrace new ways of exploring conventional textile techniques.
From Kaz Thorpe’s felted faces, Rita Crawford’s costumes, and the machine embroidered paper by Jayde Clacy, to the textile sample books of Carol French, and the accomplished panache of the works by Dorothy Devine, the exhibition impresses with its versatility and sense of adventure.
The Pamela Bell Art Space at the Stanthorpe Gallery is introducing a selection of artworks from The Travelling Quilters Challenge, an initiative of Kerry Cannon from the Ceramic Break Sculpture Park in Warialda, NSW.
Participants in this triennial event create art quilts incorporating supplied materials into their original concepts.
Themes include the cosmos as seen in the work by the grand prize winner Judi Nikoleski, which integrates relief printing, dye painting, and applique.
Responses to living through the pandemic, and interpretations based on the Year of the Ox have added personal perspectives to a colourful and rewarding exhibition.