A Pile of Mountains — acrylic and oil on canvas, 410mm x 830mm. My fascination with the shapes and layers of mountains just keeps growing, and this one pushes it further still. I'm also completely taken with the strong pink light that envelops the Queenstown area in spring, washing over the mountains, and the touches of red and pink in this work give a gentle nod to that. The peaks stack up densely, one after another, each one a different colour: deep greens, blues, mustards, reds and rust, almost like a patchwork quilt of mountains rather than any single range. The linework crisscrosses over the top, tracing out a loose grid across the whole thing, tying all those different peaks back together into one dense, tangled pile.
Queenstown Mountain Lake - small acrylic study on unstretched canvas. I flew over Queenstown recently and saw a number of mountain lakes below. To me they felt moody and lonely, utterly beautiful, and this little study came out of that feeling. Dark, brooding mountains in deep browns and charcoal greys press right up against a strip of quiet blue water, with olive greens filling in the foreground below. It's loose and quick, more about that sense of scale and stillness from the air than any real detail, but the mood is exactly what I was after.
Otago Mountain Layers — acrylic on board, 300mm x 300mm. Every day I discover more different shapes in the views of the mountains around Otago. The layers and shapes fascinate me, as do the colours: golds from the tussock, reds and pinks from that jaw-dropping sunset light, darks from the black lichen, whites from the winter snow. The schist itself holds shades of grey, purple, yellow oxide and burnt sienna. Big, bold planes of colour stack and overlap here, warm mustard and ochre pushing against cool white and grey, with a deep red and near-black anchoring one corner, and hints of purple threading through the rock itself. It feels less like a single view and more like all those layers of mountain, catching different light at different times, pulled together into one.
Crown Terrace — small test panel, acrylic on paper. Inspired by the interplay of farmland, wild tussock, rocks and snow along Crown Terrace. Deep greens, warm golds and earthy browns sit underneath, with sweeping strokes of white and pale grey pushing in over the top like drifts settling across the farm and the peaks beyond. It's rugged and layered, more a feeling of that landscape than any one clean view of it.
Spring in The Rees Valley — small acrylic study on unstretched canvas. Reflecting the view from our friends' cabin, where we've spent many happy days, this brings to life the snow-covered mountains, the rain melt, swelling rivers and waterfalls of spring in the Rees Valley. Dark navy and near-black push in from above, like the last of the winter storms, while golds and warm ochre push up from below, standing in for the tussock waking up for the season. Streaks of white and pale grey run right through the middle, tracing the rush of meltwater and swollen rivers, with rust and brown grounding it all like the exposed earth after the snow starts to shift. This is one of my favourite places on earth.
Tasman Glacier — small acrylic test panel on paper. This work was inspired by flying into Tasman Glacier. It emerges in front of you, powerful and gorgeous all at once. The blues, greens and greys of the landscape and the glacier itself were mesmerising. Here though, it's the heat and drama of the moment that came through, deep reds, burnt orange and near-black taking over the centre, with cooler greys, greens and soft blues pushing in around the edges. It's less a literal view of the ice and more that jolt of awe you get seeing something so massive appear out of nowhere.
Queenstown at Dusk from Cardrona Ski Field - acrylic on board, 300mm x 300mm. My favourite view when I ski at Cardrona is from the top, above Soho Basin. In this work I imagine the view just on dusk, looking west over Queenstown out towards Glenorchy, when the sun drops behind the mountains and throws light up into the clouds. Deep browns, burgundies and rich rust reds dominate the mountainside here, with a faint white outline of the Remarkables against the darkening landscape. Behind it all, the sky sits dark and heavy, browns and near-blacks pressing in, with a hint of gold breaking through at the edges. There's a stillness to it that only comes just before the light disappears completely.
Glacier at Earnslaw Burn — acrylic on canvas. I spent a day at Earnslaw Burn and the place had a huge impact on me. As we flew over the glacier it totally mesmerised me. The literal colour palette of the landscape is more limited than this painting, but this work tries to capture some of the magic that is there. The glacier itself makes a strong appearance, with the blue tracing the waterfalls found everywhere in this place. The deep purples reference the schist running through the rock there, dense and almost brooding against the black, while the peach, coral and orange break through like sunlight hitting the glacier's edges. It's not a literal view of the glacier, more the intensity and emotion of standing somewhere so overwhelming.
Arrowtown's Sleeping Child — acrylic on board, 300mm x 300mm. The view from our home in Arrowtown takes in the sleeping child, the profile of the mountains that wrap around the town, looking northwest. Locals call it that as the outline reads like the face of a child lying on its back, fast asleep. Deep blues and near-blacks make up the bulk of the range here, moody and quiet against a soft yellow sky, like the colours of a deep, undisturbed dream. A streak of red cuts across the lower slope, warm and almost glowing against all that darkness, giving the mountain a bit of weight and presence. It's a simple, still image, but there's something a little watchful about it too, like the mountain really is just resting.
The Softness of Spring — acrylic on canvas board. This work is about the way spring gently eases the harshness of winter, smoothing those sharp edges into something softer, and the way the light itself turns gentler too. Layer upon layer of soft peaks in muted greens, blues and dusty pink drift across the canvas, hazy and tender rather than hard-edged. The charcoal linework tracing over the top hints at winter's sharper outlines still there underneath, but everything else has settled into something calmer, bathed in that softer spring light.
work in progress
My strongest influences are otago and auckland.
LANDSCAPES have a powerful impact on me. The forms are representational and the colour palettes reflect that response.
Some work is available for purchase. Please contact me for pricing and more information.