Connection to the land plays a pivotal part in Hunter Valley landscape artist Rebecca Rath's work. Her new exhibition, Infinite Never Never, is no exception.
"Placing herself outside the relative comforts of the 'landscaped' fields of vines and weaving grasses of the Hunter Valley wine-growing area of Pokolbin, landscape artist Rebecca Rath provides a chance to dig into something that is primal within us: our connection to the land and our life-and-death reliance on it," says Art Systems Wickham gallery director Colin Lawson on Rath's new exhibition.
Infinite Never Never is on display at the gallery until September 18. It is a series of 12 Australian landscapes inspired by her recent pilgrimage to Grawin, in the remote outback of NSW. This is her third solo exhibition to be held at Art Systems Wickham.
"Making the trek to paint in Grawin from my comfortable space of the Hunter Valley was like entering an alien landscape. The entire colour palette was foreign, the plants were unfamiliar, and I felt like a stranger to the harsh terrain," Rath says.
"While I sketched feverishly and hurried in the blazing hot sun, I felt both overwhelmed by the harshness of the environment and delighted by its unique and subtle beauty."
Rath has painted landscapes for the past five years and exhibited and sold works across Australia and overseas. Living in Pokolbin has influenced her current style. She and partner Ryan Jenkins, a photographer, love travelling the region, and Rath says she could paint the valley forever.
Their latest trip to inland Australia was a last minute decision for New Year's Eve.
"I think we wanted a little bit of a change and a challenge. I've really wanted to do central Australia, and I've really liked the idea of seeing landscape that's different to the valley," Rath says.
She found Lightning Ridge and the surrounding region to be quite "full on", but she's hoping with this exhibition she makes harsh landscapes more approachable.
"A cactus, although it's quite spikey, it's a beautiful plant," she says. "It's always a joy to find new colours on my palette, the dusty pinks of the earth against the sage greens of the succulent spear-shaped leaves proved to me that nature got it right, again."
Says Lawson: "Rath's landscape paintings are not necessarily just a representation of landscape, but rather something that, in being constructed out of pieces of representation, or possibly echoes of former representation, kindles an experience of its own and frame the space where artists shift to speaking about the landscapes with an abstract voice."
Alongside the exhibition, Rath will be running a communal workshop for landscape painters to get together and paint. The en plein air painting workshop is on Saturday, September 17, 10am to 4pm. Participants will receive individual tuition as well as a painting demonstration from Rath. To book, email rebeccarathartist@gmail.com.
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