Contemplating Grace -Sydney Printmakers

GCS Gallery, Abbotsleigh, Wahroongah

2 Sept - 30 September 2022

CONTEMPLATING GRACE is a creative response by Sydney Printmakers to the art and life of the iconic Australian artist, Grace Cossington Smith.

Multi-plate relief woodblock with direct transfer

Unique State

Polyptych: 140cm x 206cm (each panel 140cm x 50cm)

I gravitated to a less characteristic work of Cossington Smith, Four panels for a screen: loquat tree, gum and wattle trees, waterfall, picnic in a gully, 1929. The work is distinctive in that the landscape is divided between the familiar and the visited which aligns with my approach to blending geographies, while paralleling Cossington Smith who drew inspiration from close to her home and generally within the borders of urban living.

Sharing this underlying connection my work draws from a familiar everyday landscape the acacia scrub and craggy headlands of my coastal home and once lovingly tended gardens. I aimed for an independent but united set of images which pay homage to Cossington Smith, the legacy of Modernist painting while celebrating the strength and rhythms within the Australian coastal bush landscape.