25th August 2012 - Meaghan Coles

Meaghan Coles is a newly established artist and a recent Honours graduate from Uni SA’s South Australian School of Art 2010 with a Bachelor of Visual Arts. Coles’ is a contemporary painter whose works are as inspiring and genuine as the artist herself. Her emotive artworks are abstracted figurative representations portraying photographs of models that explores how the female face is objectified within popular advertising. Coles’ uses the traditional medium of oil paint, but then combines it with various mixed media techniques such as spray enamel, acrylic, ink, pen, charcoal and resin allowing accidental mark making to generate an impression of greater depth in order to symbolically restore some expression and personality to the picture-perfect, sexualized faces that seem to be devoid of any individuality and create a new, fresh uniqueness to these previously superficial portrayals. (Image to the right: 'Elegance' 90cmX60cm, Oil On Board).

The images have been painted on various surfaces such as ply wood, canvas and board combined with a collage of newspapers which are transferred onto the paintings using a gel medium and are generally displayed  in the background of the composition creating multiple layers and textures. Interestingly, Coles’ does not prime the surface of the wood in anyway, but retains its natural state in order to allow the grain and imperfections of the wood to emerge forth from the alleged beauty of the painted models. The reasoning behind this technique is to permit the subtlety of her symbolism to be observed in plain sight, being the imperfections that all individuals posses, including these seemingly perfect women publicized in adverting that are supposed to portray flawless beauty.

Coles painting detail the beauty and imperfections of the subject simultaneously with her successful use of positive and negative space in her compositions and the way that she manipulates the imagery effectively captivates the main focal points of the models being the impeccable cheekbones, bold eyes and pouting lips. The abstracted, washed over approach is regularly and competently used in her works, it has the ability to draw the attention of the viewers gaze to the key elements of the imagery and captivate them with the beauty of its subtle skin tones, bold lines and its rough aesthetic finish.

Aside from being a clearly talented up and coming artist, Coles’ beautiful imagery which is clearly laden with underlying metaphors of ignorant beauty, raises concerning topic within our social culture being the objectified portrayal of women in advertisement. This notion is well translated in one particular painting, titled '10 Rules of Beauty', upon which she uses newspaper collage in the background presenting an article describing the ten rules of beauty. The theory is portrayed candidly but effectively, being that what they are selling will make you beautiful and infer that you must have it. However, Coles artworks are just as bold in there execution by demonstrating how obvious it is that the media is trying to force their perception of beauty on society and in turn encourages us to look beyond the portrayal of unattainable beauty and question  the true reflection of what constitutes as magnificence.

Coles’ is not only an inspiring visual artist who has well revealed and executed an obvious skill as a painter and conceptual artist, she is also the winner of the 2011 SALA Festival, Adelaide Central School of Art Professional Development award! Coles’ also spent 6 months in upstate New York on an exchange scholarship which she has indicated had a huge impact on her practice today, being more experimental. Even though the subject matter is similar you can notice a shift to a looser style. 

Tomorrow is the last day of SALA where you can see this amazing talent paint live and view her works on King William Street between 10-4pm. Your in for a treat!

Meaghan Coles with her image, What's hot, what's not, and what's always a classic, 240 x 120cm, Oil on board

'What's now', 90x60cm, Oil, pen, spray enamel & resin on board

2nd August 2012 - Alice Blanch

At UniSA this week, we had the pleasure of emerging photographic artist Alice Blanch join us to discuss her art practice and share her journey up to date.

Blanch is an up-and-coming, very talented young Australian photographer who works with alternative analogue photographic processes to create truly beautiful images that surpass time and place. Blanch is influenced by the transient nature of the sky and its ever changing relationship with the landscape below. Aside from being aesthetically beautiful, the imagery she produces tends to evoke fleeting memories and emotions. Blanch has unquestionably mastered the art of film photography, which is evident with her remarkable ‘Box Brownie’ panoramas, that are truly inspirational, if not breathtaking. The images are motivated by the textures of the landscape and posses an ethereal and ghostly quality that appear to be inspired by photographers of the late 19^th and early 20^th century. 

A fan of the road-trip, many of Blanch’s images have been taken on various trips to the outskirts of Adelaide and whilst travelling around Australia. Her images express her vision of the Australian Lanscape that embody an inner authenticity and explore the nature of the sublime. Blanch has consciously chosen the Box Brownie camera for its simplistic design with only two settings,  to shift the focus to the creative process which allows her to take multiple exposures in-camera to create the panoramas.

In 2010, Blanch won the Helpmann award, then in 2011 she exhibited in SALA Festival at the Fringe Benefits Gallery on Hindley St and again this year 2012 at Gallery on Waymouth. Blanch has also attended a Tin Type photography workshop in Victoria at Gold Street Studios which was funded by a grant from Carclew Youth Arts. Since the workshop, Blanch has taken some time out from university study to experiment with the processes further and to learn all of the technical aspects of which she now teaches along with various wet-plate workshops with James Tylor and Alex Bishop-Thorpe at the Fontanelle Studio. 

Blanch completed her Bachelor of Visual Arts last year, specializing in photography at the South Australian School of Art and is currently living in Hobart whilst completing her Honours in photography at the Tasmanian School of Art. Undoubtedly, Blanch is only at the beginning of what I am sure will be an amazing career. To view more of the amazing images from Blanch, check out her website www.aliceblanch.com 

It seems that more photographic artists are embracing the “Art” of film photography with its resurgence of the nostalgic and the sense of memory that it provokes. There is something about the process of watching the images unfold before you and the sense of anticipation that comes with it. I for one am on board….let the revolution begin.



'Box Brownie Panorama #1' 20x45cm Edition of 3 (sold)



'Box Brownie Panorama #3' 20x57cm Edition of 3



'Box Brownie Panorama #12' 20x74cm Edition of 3





1st August - The End Is Near

The artist's world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep. — Paul Strand

Well a new semester is upon me and already travelling along at lightening speed. What makes it particularly scary, is that it is the second part of my major and at the end of the year I will be sent out into the world to create art all on my own. This is an exciting, yet daunting prospect.  So here we are....nearing the end and yet I feel as though I am only at the beginning of my artistic journey.  I had so many ideas of what I wanted to acheive before I finished my degree and have not come close to being able to outwork the endless abyss of ideas that are whirling around in my mind . I think it may be called delusions of grandeur. Dont get me wrong, I have had academic success, but there was so much more I had wanted to acheive and already fear there is just not enough time. I realise time, like most things is a relative term. Of course, some will say that there will be plenty of time to create once my degree is completed, but there is also the pressure of finding work and making money, both pressures of which can certainly be theives of inspiration. So.... aside from creating an inspiring body of work to show at the graduates exhibition, I now need to find the inspiration to discover what comes next.....ironically, only time will tell.

4th July 2012 - Deborah Paauwe

 

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. — Scott Adams

Greenaway Art Gallery's latest exhibition reveals works from internationally renown photographic artist Deborah Paauwe. As always her photographs are hauntingly mysterious and her most recent body of work The Painted Mirror is no different.

As is the case with much of the American-born artists work, there is a hieghtened sense of intrigued created by the element of anominity due to the faces of the subjects being obscured, erased from the viewers gaze. In this situation, it is via a series of ornate handheld props, such as vintage colourful paper fans and hand-held painted mirrors. Like many of Paauwe's earlier works, there is an undeniable narrative with autobiographical linkages to personal history, in particular her part-Chinese heritage. Paauwe cites there is a cultural sensibility of concealing one’s emotions which seems to be an obvious inspiration for the series.  

Employing the use of sequins and symbology related to the world of child beauty pageants this series of staged portraits relay a tension between the public and private. Although Paauwe's highly gestural photographs beautifully capture the young girls striking a variety of melodramtic poses, the images certainly have an element of unease and indicate that something is askew

2nd July 2012 - Welcome

"Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." — Ralph Waldo Emerson, Poet

Welcome to 'For Art Sake' a companion blog to my website for all lovers of art. Please let me introduce myself.... My name is Danae Thyssen, I am an Adelaide based visual artist,  freelance writer, social commentator, and karaoke enthusiast. I have a few blogs, some of which are educational, in addition to my blog 'Talk About Town' where we explore lifes little mysteries, along with some amusing stories and situations that are tragically my life. However, being the eternal optomist, I always endevour to seek out the positives in life.....failing that, at least we can all have a laugh at my misadventures.

A highly motivated and passionate achiever with a strong sense of ethics, my ability to achieve a high standard of work is enhanced with any given task. My passion and drive are well dedicated to the pusuit of all things artistic, from the written word through to performance based and fine arts.   I have a strong belief that regardless of the hand we are delt that we are the masters of our own destiny and we chose our lifes direction and it is my intension to live a full life within the arts. 

Aside from my independent art practice, I am available for commissioned works. My business is based on the belief that the customers' needs are of the utmost importance. I am committed to meeting those needs. As a result, a high percentage of my business is from repeat customers and referrals.

Thanks for visiting!
I hope you can find have found your time at 'For Arts Sake' interesting. Please remember I am focused on providing high-quality service and customer satisfaction and will endevour to do everything I can to meet your expectations. With a variety of approaches  to choose from, I trust you will be happy working with me. Look around my site and if you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact me. I hope to see you again! Check back later for new updates to my blog. There's much more to come!