Blog

The 2023 Incognito Art Show is a not-for-profit, artists-supporting-artists initiative raising funds for artists with disabilities at Studio A and Little Orange Studio in Sydney. This year over 2000 works were donated by artist from across Australia. The Incognito Art Show isn’t an ordinary art sale. Every A5 sized artwork, regardless of artist, is sold for just $100.

Check out a few of the ways I create surface and visual texture in my paintings. They're a couple of my go-to options when I'm treating larger areas of space, especially when I'm working with just paint - no collage. This is one of the studies I did for my 'Wall of Curiosities' where I was keen to explore bold and simple compositions - and that meant keeping the shapes interesting in some way!

I needed to work with warm colours today, it's a bit chilly here in Queensland at the moment! I chose a range of analogous colours from yellow-orange-red to get me started. I also happened upon a little box of interesting collage snippings that I thought I'd incorporate - hence the bubbles. I'm not sure where the inner circles ended up but I love the little windows these 'leftovers' create.

I’ve been meaning to try beginning with a black background to see what difference that makes to the final piece and I had a 30 x 30 cm board to experiment with, just lying around so I thought I’d give it a go whilst I still had the blues and ranges on my palette. The black underneath created unexpected little pockets of deep 'space' which were intriguing. I’m not sure I could have achieved these without the black under painting.

I think I must have been dreaming about a field trip to South Australia, as whilst I was working on this sketch, I felt a sudden urge to disappear into space….not literally, I’m not sure these rocket builders quite have their machines failsafe enough yet, but ‘space’ as in wide open space…..

There's nothing like a little collage exercise to explore interesting textures, contrasts and compositions! Using leftover pieces from the gel prints I did for my Dusty Summer sketch I spent a happy couple of hours putting together there small A5 sized collages, to add to my 'Wall of Curiosities.' Working with collage always feels a little simplistic as it's one of the earliest art making methods we're introduced to as kids in school.