Born in Hanan, Germany, Maris migrated to Australia in 1949.

In the early 1980s, he set out with a fellow photographer on a road trip “to bring an Australian light to the large format photograph.”

Their goal was to develop three skills: the conceptual — to see or pre-visualise; the technical — to operate cameras and control chemistry; and the physical — to lug the camera, all 50 kg of it, to the subject or place!

It meant loading large format film holders in the cramped spaces of motel wardrobes ... photographing in the field ... only being able to make 6-8 photographs a day ... in the sweltering heat of mid-summer’s sun.*

acquired:         1988, Heritage Art Festival, Stanthorpe

* from Original Photographs by Doug Spowart (written at Girraween, 2014)

Born in Solicchiata, Sicily, Carmelo was known as a gentleman with a big personality.

Diverse skills served him as a Real Estate Agent, vegetable grower, song writer and musician, builder, wine grower, collector of antiques, a President of Dante Alighieri, and a founding member and tutor of The Stanthorpe Pottery Club.

From 1971, experimenting with pottery, Carmelo turned to local clays, learning what worked well alone or blended with other materials sourced from Melbourne. He built his own studio and kilns and formulated his own glazes — his handling of celadons was particularly assured. Carmelo’s combination of cream and brown clays became a signature.

acquired:         2020, purchased from the Pennisi family

Born in Melbourne, Greg studied pottery at RMIT in the mid-70s.

A man of BIG numbers, his luminous pottery is represented worldwide, in 24 book publications, 80 art galleries and art museums, and 36 major awards.

He has shown in 100 solo- and 250 group-exhibitions, in Australia and overseas, and has given over 150 workshops and lectures throughout Australia and New Zealand.

In 1999, Greg received a grant to research the effect of firing cycles on the development of copper red glazes.

Of his glazes, he says,

Light and lustre have a synergy that creates colour and movement. Lustre is not something you control, it is something you encourage and entice into being.

acquired:         2004, Stanthorpe Art Prize

While living in isolated Western Australia in 1991, Judy was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study narrative embroideries in the UK. Later, still largely self-taught, she tutored throughout Australia and New Zealand.

I use various techniques: dying, air-brushing, painting, mono-printing, hand-made silk paper and surface stitchery. It is the combination of these plus layered, hand stitchery that gives the work the depth, distance and play of light ...   J.W.

The perfect cedar box was made by Judy’s craftsman husband, Cliff Wilford. It has been signed by the maker.

acquired:    2011, Of the Land exhibition

English-born, Andrew Sibley emigrated to Australia in 1948. The following year, he came to Stanthorpe to work at Walter Sweet's orchard.

Here, we meet a couple dancing barefoot under the night sky, surrounded by verdant bush growing from a small, grassy circle. The tiled box evokes the work-a-day world to which Sibley offers alternatives.

This series reminds us of our primal and natural instincts to be a part, or rather, respond to nature — to love, to own our passions.   A.S.

While establishing a significant career with over 80 solo exhibitions in Australia and overseas, Sibley retained his connection to Stanthorpe, judging the Stanthorpe Art Festival (1970) and later, winning the Stanthorpe Acquisition Prize (1991).

acquired: 1998

John Olsen's representation of Brett Whiteley about to pounce appears as an extravagant bundle of marks that refuse to settle on the paper. The vigorous mapping of dots and lines comes together in an exuberant expression of his friend and fellow artist. Olsen produced a similarly animated image of Whiteley in 1979 titled Brett Whiteley pondering on erotica, ink on paper, and in 1982, a gentler expression of the artist Portrait of Brett Whiteley, pastel on paper.

Among John Olsen's achievements were the 2005 Archibald Prize for a self-portrait, the Wynne Prize in 1969 and 1985, and the Sulman Prize in 1989.

acquired: 1979

The intrigue of this work lies between the flatness of the 2-dimensional print and the 3-dimensional, sculptural relief of the weaving. Nature and artifice come together in the notion of a handcrafted representation of the landscape in the process of becoming, and the 'already formed' backdrop of a traditional representation of landscape.

Jean Constantine has given us an alternative perspective on the Stanthorpe environment by capturing the dynamic nature of a living ecology in tune with the timelessness of Nature.

acquired: 1986

Kay, a Queenslander, was an innovative textile designer and weaver. In 2016, she wove the wool and silk cloth that would be used on the robes of Australia’s High Court judges.

My philosophy is to weave beautiful cloth and unique textiles, which industry is unable to achieve. I consider myself ... both a textile artist and an exacting craft worker ... both roles being of equal importance in my practice.   K.F.

Ever alert to opportunities for sharing her knowledge and skills with others, she ran frequent workshops.

When friends drop in, like all Kay’s work, is highly individual, a charming creation that displays her deft use of metaphor.

acquired: 1998, Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Lindsay Muir, who studied at the University of Southern Queensland, often exhibits in Stanthorpe. His keenly observed sculptural works are rich in colour and detail, catching and holding the eye with gentle humour. He is known also for his elegant, thrown and hand-built pieces.

Lindsay has worked in interesting locations, such as Norfolk Island, Qld’s north coast hinterland and in Lincolnshire, England. He creates artworks on commission for National and Private parks.

A love of sculpture and painting are combined to produce my work. Realism is not so important. The ultimate goal is ‘bring clay to life’ ... I want my work to be a feast for the senses.   L.M.

acquired: 1996, Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Vida Lahey, one of Australia’s leading still life artists of the 20th C, learnt painting at Brisbane Technical College. She then studied at the National Gallery School in Melbourne and with Frederick McCubbin. Exhibiting regularly in Australian galleries and in Paris, London and the United States, she is now represented in collections throughout Australia.

One of the co-founders of the Queensland Art Fund in 1927, she established children’s art classes at the Queensland Art Gallery in 1941, applying her philosophy of a universal language of art.

She is noted especially for her ‘vivacious and sensitive treatment of light and colour’.*

acquired: 1997 — donated by Mrs Pam Chiverton and Mrs Helen Lerch, in memory of their parents, Mr and Mrs T. W. Fagg.

* Margaret Maynard in the Australian Dictionary of Biography

UK-born, Kathleen came to Australia with her family in 1927. She studied briefly at Brisbane Technical College of Art but undertook no further formal studies until she travelled to Italy and London in the early 60s.

Home again, Kath honed her command of sculptural form, but also taught drawing in her beloved medium of pen and ink at Queensland University and at the Technical College.

A founding member of Queensland’s Society of Sculptors and the Wildlife Artists Society, she is perhaps best known for the bronze pelicans in QAGOMA’s Watermall, created in collaboration with husband, Len,  in 1984.

She was awarded an AM for services to sculpture and education in 1986.

acquired: 1987

Born in Sydney, Jean de Courtenay Isherwood won a scholarship to the National Art School at East Sydney Technical College. Isherwood's first exhibited work with the Australian Watercolour Institute in 1934 was a small painting of a building site. From that time, she became a frequent exhibitor in major art exhibitions. She was a student of Antonio Dattilo Rubbo.

Influenced by Dorothea Mackellar’s iconic poem My Country, Isherwood loved the harsh beauty of Australia. The Sydney environment that she learned to paint in gave her an appreciation of linear perspective and accurate draughtsmanship which she later applied with great skill to her rural landscapes.

acquired: 1980

Canadian born Jim Brodie earned his BFA at Concordia University of Edmonton in 1970 and taught in Calgary and Washington.  He moved to Australia in 1982, teaching in various institutions in Brisbane and Tasmania. 

This work was commissioned in 1987 by the Stanthorpe Spring Wine Festival Committee. The use of lithography creates this complex but subtle representation of Girraween National Park.

His recent works convey social commentary on issues, such as greed and hypocrisy, exploitation of the environment or the treatment of migrants or minority groups.

acquired: 1988

Born in England, Joanna studied glass design at Wolverhampton University in the UK and has a master’s degree from the Royal College of Art, London.

Arriving in Australia in 2002, Joanna found herself living along Queensland’s coast. The colours, textures and forms found in this new environment reinvigorated her interests in pattern, regularity and repetition.

The lightness and specificity of this work echoes the wonderous underwater world.

Internationally recognised, her work is held in the National Gallery of Australia, the Australian National Glass Collection and the Film Museum of Tehran.

acquired: 2018, Stanthorpe Art Prize

Tom grew up on a sheep station in outback Queensland and moved to Stanthorpe in 2003 from the Blue Mountains.

Stanthorpe has an energy about it that makes it a great place for artists.

I was inspired to do drawings of ploughed fields from several flights I took out to Broken Hill while living in the Blue Mountains. I was taken by the patterns of the ploughed fields near the Dubbo airstrip as we were coming into land. They were like huge installations. Very beautiful but only for a slight moment.

The title ‘The Farmer’s trust’ comes from the beautiful piece of music by a jazz guitarist Pat Metheny.   T.S.

acquired: 2004

English-born Sibley is recognised as one of Australia’s most celebrated 20th Century artists.

In 1948, his family moved to an orchard in Eukey, Stanthorpe. He lived in Papua New Guinea in the late 50s, returning to Queensland in 1958 where he associated with Jon Molvig.

Andrew Sibley taught at Sydney’s Mary White School of Art, and lectured in Fine arts at RMIT and at Caulfield Campus of Monash University, Melbourne.

The Encyclopedia of Australian Art states

... his figurative painting is bold, with emphasis on controlled distortion.

Winter Orchard won the 1998 Stanthorpe Acquisition Prize.

Andrew Sibley was one of the Stanthorpe Art Festival Judges in 2007.

acquired: 1995: donated to the gallery by the artist

This work was donated by the Stanthorpe Wine Committee. It epitomises the seasons of the Granite Belt region and captures the last leaves on the grape vine.

John Millington won many awards and was the recipient of the Stanthorpe Water Colour Prize in 1984. He had numerous exhibitions on the east coast of Australia and he is included in the McCulloch Encyclopaedia and Germaine Artists and galleries of Australia and New Zealand.

In 1987, Millington produced his first book Tropical Visions, depicting 25 Queensland Artists. In 2003, he published John Rigby, Art and Life. He was an art critic and regional arts correspondent for the Courier Mail.

acquired: 1988

Born in London, Warner studied printing and commercial art at a local college, learning lithography, woodcut, etching, airbrushing and scraperboard. He ran his own commercial studio.

Arriving in Australia in 1910 and unable to find work, he moved to New Zealand as head of job-printing at ‘The Star’.

Returning to Australia in 1919, he worked as a commercial artist. He continued etching and began exhibiting, gaining quite a reputation. During the depression years, Warner also produced popular etchings under various pseudonyms.

In the 1930s, Warner and his wife travelled around NSW and Victoria collecting material for his prints. The Gallery holds several of his works.

acquired: 1978

Fay's initiation into art practice began when she participated in a machine embroidery workshop by Carol Wilkes in 1999. This experience kindled a deep interest in textile art.

A McGregor Summer School workshop followed in 2000. Glenys Mann, her tutor on that occasion, was influential in nurturing self-belief and encouraging deeper exploration of one’s art.

A collector of bones, feathers and weathered, rusty, worn and torn things, Fay follows the Japanese art concept of wabi-sabi that explores the aesthetics of the imperfect, impermanent and incomplete.

Shibui #1 was winner of the local artist award in the Stanthorpe Art Prize.

acquired: 2018: Stanthorpe Art Prize

For Canadian-born Joe, Frosted post evokes a striking memory: working at the Queensland Art Gallery during the 1993 Asia Pacific Triennial exhibition, he encountered Woods lll, an array of carved and frosted posts by Shigeo Toya.

The group reminded me of winters in Saskatchewan and the hoar frost on the fence posts ... that piece of wood just called out for a similar treatment, ... memories of Canadian Winters and the beauty of extreme cold.

Beginning in 2004, he has mounted three exhibitions of his artworks at SRAG. A Stanthorpe Gallery volunteer, Joe’s expert eye has long been an asset in his role as exhibition curator.

acquired: 2021

Born in Denmark, Martin is self-taught. A gift of a 1911 box camera when he was 11 ignited his love of photography, particularly the black and white of artists Ansel Adams and Henri Cartier Bresson.

His diverse Australian output has been published in Arts, Lifestyle and news media.

He and artist wife, Jan, supported many artists’ careers from their Brisbane-based Ardrossan and Riverhouse Galleries.

Winter Muse was shot in Darlinghurst, Sydney. Martin, a member of the Brisbane Camera Group,

lived photography in those days ... developing and printing in my darkroom under the house. A great shame the craft has gone. Digital black/white is not the same.

acquired: 1988: Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Australian born, Barbara was the recipient of the country’s first ever grant for an apprenticeship with a Craftsmen in the Community — Master Weaver Erika Semler. She has attended classes with top spinners, weavers, dyers and designers from around the world and is experienced in a range of textile techniques.

She has been showcased at numerous international and Australian exhibitions and has won many awards. Barbara taught in the TAFE system for many years and has given numerous residential and weekend workshops all over Australia.

Jacket for dreaming of the bush is constructed of squares woven on a hand-held loom.

acquired: 1998: Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Fiona Hiscock grew up in rural Victoria where her parents loved visiting antique shops.

We had old sheds filled with ... objects ... I was always drawn to the ... basins and bowls designed for faithful service to people or their livestock rather than fine China.

Fiona is now Melbourne-based, but does a lot of walking in wilderness areas, where she carefully observes the bird life.

She hand-builds and decorates large, coiled forms. Her decoration is inspired by botanical illustration and she makes detailed paintings of plant specimens to inform her practice.

Her work is represented in many private and public collections.

acquired: 2021: Stanthorpe Art Prize

Shona currently lives on Worimi Country where she makes art that displays her engagement with natural found materials.

Creating with Nature’s overlooked fragments brings me closer to understanding the world we share. These … act as ‘keys’, unlocking doors to memory, science, history and imagination.

Shona graduated in 1990 in Visual Arts–Sculpture from Sydney College of the Arts.

She has completed an Art Omni Residency in New York and been a finalist in prestigious Art Prizes. Her work is held in state collections.

Among the ‘natural debris’ of this work — crab claws, seeds and beetle wings — one ‘unnatural’ fragment, plastic, is found, inviting us to cherish not degrade our pristine natural places.

acquired: 2010: Stanthorpe Art Festival

Pittwater-based artist Susan Rushforth holds a Master of Fine Arts from the University of NSW. She studied traditional Japanese printmaking in Kyoto in 1990-91; a UNSW research grant enabled further study in 1994. Susan developed skills in papermaking, print, sumi-bokusho brushwork, shoji and screen restoration, and woodblock printing.

Kyoto hosted an exhibition of Susan’s art in 1994; group exhibitions followed in countries around the world. Her work is held in many collections.

In 2000, Susan was a resident artist at Bundanon. She has remained engaged in education — facilitating workshops in Sydney — and creates works inspired by Nature.

Beneath Shadows brings to mind the colours and contrasts of winter on the Granite Belt.

acquired: 1996

Sydney-born Blackman was one of Australia’s most celebrated artists. Leaving school at 13, he worked as a newspaper illustrator and attended evening art classes at East Sydney Technical College.

Blackman produced his famous Schoolgirl series between 1952 and 1955. His first solo exhibition in 1953 secured him the support of influential art patrons John and Sunday Reed, of Heide fame.

He came to be defined by his membership of the Antipodean movement, alongside John Brack and Arthur Boyd. Their 1959 manifesto protested the dominance of abstract expressionism in art.

Figures, Flowers and Full Moon reflects rich emotional imagery, an exploration of the human condition.

acquired: 1989, through donation by Pamela Bell

Andrew Nott was born in Sydney. He studied at the Camberwell Art School in London, where he lived between 1959 and 1963. He has travelled extensively in Europe, the USA and Southeast Asia.

Considered an ‘elder statesman of Australian painting’, Andrew paints in oils and acrylics. He has exhibited in many Australian cities and is represented in many galleries.

In 1970, he won the Flotto Lauro Art Prize which included travel to Italy. He was a finalist in the 2013 Blake Prize.

acquired: 1974: Stanthorpe Art Festival

Jean came with her family to Australia from England in 1917. They settled in Dalveen.

She was self-taught and had a life-long involvement in the Arts, particularly in association with the CWA, of which she was a founding member and later, the youngest President.

Mal Pidgeon, her nephew, remembered her as

a woman of high spirits and big smiles ... during WW2 she started making stuff for Australian soldiers overseas. ... Her embroidery was done very carefully, and perfectly ... because she had so much time to get it right.

Jean was also very good at reciting poetry.

She was 106 when she died.

acquired: 1986: commissioned by the Stanthorpe Art Gallery Society

Mark Rode has been fascinated with sculpture since childhood. He recognises “the powerful energy of some ancient carvings” and “chases that intangible quality” in his own work.

This small figure is exquisitely formed. Light plays on the contours of the young man’s body, emphasizing his fitness and youth. There is great poignancy in the way he is positioned, perhaps thinking of old stories and how these align with the inequalities under which his people live; perhaps he dreams of how he can change it.

Mark Rode left Australia in 1998 to explore sculpture in Europe. He now lives in Ireland with his family, where he has a studio and foundry.

acquired: 1998

Di’s background is in Interior Design; she graduated with a Master of Fine Arts from QUT in 2004. She has lived and taught in Queensland and New Zealand.

My influences in sculpture are Giacometti and Brancusi ... and I love the work of Rosalie Gascoyne. ... As an artist, my ... focus is always one of optimism, often showing challenges in life ... with an injection of humour and playfulness. ... These ... sculptures are based on metaphors, words and phrases and their interpretation in my mind's eye.

Her work is held in galleries in Japan, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland as well as in many corporate and private collections.

acquired: 2006

Born in Lismore, Margaret, ‘defiantly individual, slightly eccentric, ... loyal, utterly determined’* — or just plain Olley, as she was known to her friends — was a collector.

Her still life paintings, the works for which she is best remembered, are filled with objects she gathered on her travels, and with which she surrounded herself in her home-cum-studio in Paddington, Sydney.

Olley mixed in artistic circles, won many awards, and was painted, sometimes controversially, by the likes of William Dobell, Russell Drysdale, Donald Friend and Judy Cassab. In her later years, she supported young artists, and made generous donations to the Art Gallery of NSW.

acquired: 1989

*(Courier Mail; Dec 24, 1993)

Donald Friend was born in Sydney, where he first studied art. He travelled widely, painting in Nigeria, Italy, Ceylon and Indonesia.

He won awards including the Blake (1955) and the Flotto Laura Prize (1951) and was a friend of Margaret Olley, Russell Drysdale, Jeffrey Smart and Brett Whiteley.

Friend’s work, which “always looked too easy — decorative, flowing and natural” is found in collections worldwide. Since his open revelations regarding his relationships with young males damaged his reputation as an artist, some galleries have chosen not to exhibit his work.

Debate continues about whether moral and aesthetic values should be considered in isolation. Should one override the other?

acquired: 1989

* art scholar, Lou Klepac

Dr Bryzenski was the first PhD graduate from the distinguished course in wildlife Illustration at Newcastle University. She won first place in an illustration competition held in conjunction with the Scientific Conference of the Australian Entomological Society held in Melbourne in 1997.

Hilda was a long-time volunteer at Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery. In June 2003, she was employed here for 3 hours a week.

Although the whimsically named “Mt Norman Residents” (Isotoma anethifolia, flowering October to May) are not unusual on the Granite Belt, Hilda’s Doctoral research was about the rare local flora and threatened species in Girraween, Mt Norman and other biodiverse areas.

acquired:         2002 — Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Helen was born in Brisbane. She obtained a Diploma of Arts (Visual) at the Queensland College of Art, now part of Griffith University, in 1978.

Since then, she has worked in various aspects of graphic design in Melbourne, Edinburgh, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Alice Springs and Toowoomba.

“For years I have painted the Darling Downs landscape, its changing patterns and colours of the different seasons. Expressive watercolour or oil paintings interpret the energy, patterns and colours created by sunlight through the day and atmosphere,” she writes on her website.

acquired:                     1990 — Heritage Arts Festival

Judy was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 1991 to study Narrative Embroideries in the U.K. She has tutored throughout Australia and New Zealand.

Judy lived in the East Kimberley for 25 years, studying by correspondence. In 2012, she said: “I would claim to be self-taught. I do believe that working in isolation with its obvious, inherent difficulties, has allowed me to develop my work with little or no outside influences.”

She said she gained inspiration for her “naturalistic and impressionistic style” from the regions lived in and visited.

Judy Wilford died in Armidale.

acquired:                     2011 — Of the Land quilt exhibition

Now based in picturesque Boonah, Chris has had solo exhibitions in Tokyo and at a World Expo. He has completed over 40 public works and has won many prizes for his art made from discarded metal components.

“My passion is to source and join unrelated objects in a manner that appears perfectly plausible. I breathe life and personality into the metal,” he writes. “My work is whimsical, creative and interactive. It takes a look at Australian culture ‘making do’.”

As if heralding the arrival of Autumn, The Three Buskers draw us in and make us laugh!

acquired:         1998 — Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Kay Jensen is an Australian ceramicist. Mainly self-taught, she creates award-winning original artworks, including wheel thrown pottery and works using fibres and natural objects.

Kay is represented in national and international collections. She has exhibited in many countries, including China, Croatia, Italy, the USA and Australia.

Jar With Leaves was burnished several times before being pit-fired to create the depth of sheen. The vibrant autumn colours are the result of firing technique — timber type, position in the firepit and length of firing — rather than an applied glaze.

Kay now lives in Bermagui, on the traditional lands of the Djiringanj clan of the Yuin Nation.

acquired:         1996 — Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Keith is a largely self-taught artist who briefly studied glass-making at Canberra Glassworks. He says that he created ‘hundreds of works’ before moving to the Granite Belt, where he facilitated workshops, teaching others skills to refine their glass-making art.

Keith is now a passionate photographer, entering his work in competitions and exhibiting in local galleries.

Uniform Decay is an enigmatic and intriguing piece. It invites the viewer to consider the paradox of the fragility and strength of glass and the inevitability of decay in all its forms.

acquired:         2006 — Stanthorpe Arts Festival

Canadian-born Australian artist Ian Tremewen first studied art in Vancouver. He now lives on the Gold Coast.

Ian’s work has been exhibited widely and is held in collections across Australia, Canada, Taiwan and the Maldives.

He works primarily in contemporary watercolours but his work includes glass, textiles, sculpture and murals. Inspired by Nature, it showcases the colours, patterns, textures and shapes of the landscape.

Ian often works in a series, exploring many possibilities and interpretations of the same subject. This work is such a landscape, vibrant with warmth and colour.

acquired:         1998

Ian Henderson was born in the UK and studied Art at Banbury, Oxford, and Swansea Colleges of Art. He taught at Leeds College of Art and was an artist in residence in Canada.

Arriving in Australia in 1972, Henderson has behind him a lifetime of practice and a plethora of publications and exhibitions in his three countries of residence.

The Dean of Architecture of the University of Queensland wrote:

…enough colour to satisfy the most demanding palate, sensuality in abundance
to capture the connoisseur, and rich content to engage the intellect.

The Gallery has several Ian Henderson works in the collection, generously donated by the artist.

acquired:         2020

Originally an occupational therapist, Fiona Gavens became a full-time quilter in 1979. Initially self-taught, due to lack of training opportunities, the artist attended numerous courses, notably a four-day course in Colour and Design whilst attending the Vermont Quilt Festival in 1986.

Gavens has exhibited across Australia. In 1985, she was selected as one of 19 Australian fibre artists to contribute work to the International Textile Exhibition in Indonesia.

First and foremost, it is a bedspread. Designed to give impact when entering the room. The back? Mainly for fun, it amuses me to be so informal with it in comparison with the formality of the top.

acquired:         1988

Albert Verschuuren was a renowned local artist who hailed from the Netherlands.

While studying economics in Canada he stumbled upon pottery and found his niche — and lifelong passion.

He moved to Australia in 1972, settling in Ipswich and arriving in Stanthorpe in 1975.

Over his career he taught at Ipswich Technical College, ran a farm, and practiced his art.

His artist’s space was indeed both his home and place of creation. In his latter years, he was a full-time potter.

His dedication to art was fired by his passion and awareness that every time he made something it was a new creation.

acquired: 1984

Dr Renata Buziak is a biochrome artist, researcher and educator working at the nexus of art and science.

This work was the winner of the 2D Print Media section of the Stanthorpe Art Prize 2021. Created on a forested property at Wilsons Downfall near Stanthorpe using the biochrome process of image making, the work fuses organic and photographic materials for a period, thus transforming and preserving both. It features wildflowers including Yellow Buttons, ‘Queen of the Bush’ and Daisy Goodenia.

The blossoms, once almost invisible in the landscape, now transformed through organic decomposition and photo-media, emerge boldly out of their bush setting to a gallery space.

acquired:         2021

Ian Currie was a passionate potter and researcher, and best known for his two books on a systematic approach to ceramic glazes.

During a year’s scholarship in Japan in 1971, he focussed on Japanese glazing methods. At that time western ceramic artists knew far less than they do now and were commonly secretive about their glazes.

Returning to Australia, he settled in quiet Maryvale, near Warwick in southeast Queensland. He made a living specialising in stoneware and porcelain functional wares that used Japanese-inspired glazes. He shared his knowledge for several years as a flying pottery lecturer with Australian Flying Arts School.

acquired:         1978

Millington was Sydney born, where he studied at The National Art School. He went on to teach art in Queensland at secondary and tertiary levels from 1967 to 1978.

Leaving education, he pursued diverse visual arts, particularly screen-printing, showing regularly at the Gold Coast City Art Gallery (GCCAG), now part of HOTA, and at the Tweed Regional Gallery.

He wrote as a newspaper Arts Critic and correspondent, mostly for the Gold Coast Bulletin, where he campaigned against GCCAG purchasing a William Robinson. He also published a biography about fellow artist, John Rigby, in 2003.

Both Robinson and Rigby are represented in the Stanthorpe Gallery’s collection.

acquired: 1992

Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery acquired Memoryscape from the 2021 Stanthorpe Art Prize where Leah won both the major award and the 2D Painting/Drawing Prize with this work. 

Her practice investigates human representations of constructed nature — gardens, aquariums and museum displays — and how we experience it within contemporary culture. The work is multi-layered, with depth characteristic of this technique.

Leah is currently based on Anaiwan country in Armidale, New South Wales.

The abundant growth of flowers symbolises the very nature of the summer season.

acquired: 2021

Maisie learned the basics of weaving at Presbyterian Ladies College, Melbourne, around 1940. In 1967, she began seriously spinning and weaving. In these processes, she used only her own hand-spun wool, concentrating on floor rugs, curtains, ponchos, skirts and jackets.

This wool, mohair and horsehair rug uses the shaft switching technique, devised by Peter Collingwood from England, that enables the weaver to design on squared paper, then apply the design to the loom. Maisie thought it to be one of the few pattern methods suitable for hand spun wool.

This rich red rug evokes the heat and flames of Australian summers.

acquired: 1978

Born in Sydney in the 60s, Stephen works in various media, including ‘found’; porcelain, painting, drawing and digital.

I deploy the strategy known as Bricolage ... recycle and reinvent found objects and images made or collected. The resultant artworks are a serendipitous, handmade, eclectic mixture, influenced by my immediate environment and popular culture. I am about challenging what is traditionally accepted as the norm ... experimentation is essential. Nothing is set in stone. Change is constant.

The lyrical landscape is occasionally seen in an excursion to South Australia. Playful angles and forms create an exuberant environment that invites the viewer to inhale summer.

acquired: 2010

In an era when male artists were still revered above their female colleagues, Simone Julienne established herself as a painter of some repute. She exhibited in the 1960s alongside Germaine Lacaze and Yvette Alde — all produced distinctive art, often boldly painted in vibrant colours — that transcended the merely ‘feminine’.

Imagine the heat of a summer’s day! Imagine the relief of cool water, refreshing on a hot summer’s night! In Night Carnivale, Julienne evokes the sounds and sights of night-time swimming.

acquired: 2002, a gift of William Bowmore AO under Cultural Gifts programme

At 20, living on the family farm in rural Howard, Don Hamilton visited Maryborough where he saw the film Moulin Rouge, and became enamoured of artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. He studied art by correspondence but moved to Brisbane in 1956 where he attended night classes.

Don’s watercolours offer nostalgic views of pastoral Australia.

He has shown in many prestigious prizes, including the Wynne, and has won numerous awards. His works are found in galleries and private collections in Australia and overseas.

Don is currently based on Turrbal country in Brisbane, where he was appointed a Fellow of the Royal Queensland Art Society in 2003.

acquired: 1984

Brash began her 50-year career in 1947 and played a pivotal role in Melbourne’s printmaking revival during the 1950s and 1960s.

She was a dynamic contributor to the Modernist scene, extending the limits of the graphic medium. Her work combining woodcuts, linocuts, lithographs and screenprints has been widely exhibited in Australia.

Heatwave is a luminous print reflecting Brash’s rich style and analytic approach. It has a mirage-like quality; shimmering heat in a sparse, vibrant landscape and summer sky.

Heatwave joined the Gallery’s collection as a donation following the 1980 Heritage Arts Festival.

acquired: 1980

Margaret Redman is an award-winning Brisbane artist. Her work has been exhibited widely in Brisbane and the Gold Coast and collected by organisations such as Moreton Shire Council.

Redman says of her work, “My aim is to develop and create a ‘living picture’ on canvas … expressing energy and movement in my painting, reflecting an affinity with the subject”.

Soft blues and patches of green within a dynamic, expressive landscape lighten the eye and the heart. Muscular brushstrokes reinforce the resilience of the bush, offering promise of regrowth and renewal, and hope that a ‘lesser burn’ can protect the landscape from the greater destruction of summer wildfire.

acquired: 2002

William Robinson first worked as an art instructor after graduating from Ballarat High School. He became Head of Painting at the Brisbane College of Advanced Education in 1982, retiring in 1989 to focus on his painting career.

Robinson first exhibited at Brisbane’s Design Arts Centre in 1967. He has twice won the Archibald and Wynne Prizes. He is now represented in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Australia.

Old Government House on the QUT’s Garden Point campus contains a gallery devoted to Robinson’s ethereal art. William and Shirley Swimming is a depiction of the dreaminess of a carefree summer.

acquired: 1988

Shun’ichi studied painting at the Academy of Tokyo and graduated from Kyoto City University of Arts.

He has lived and taught in Australia, at the Bendigo College of Advanced Education, between 1975 and 1978. While here, he was an active exhibitor, winning awards and becoming a significant influence on a generation of Australian potters.

Elegant wheel-thrown forms, frequently altered, combined with characteristic, coloured matte glazes — this one reminiscent of summer sun illuminating salty seas — distinguish his works from that period.

Now living in Japan, he holds exhibitions in between travel to countries where he has been invited to teach.

acquired: 1978

The sweltering shimmer and bleached colours of a nostalgic outback radiate from this large canvas by Otto Boron, a multi-awarded, Italian-born artist, who arrived in Australia in 1959.

His career has included work as a scenic artist for Australian television productions, such as Bellbird and One Summer Again, in which he channelled the great Heidelberg artists.

He works intuitively, supported by knowledge and experience, probing always for the connection between inner vision and subject.

Otto is based in Melbourne and has been a member of the Victorian Artists Society since 2003.

acquired: 2004

Stahl, originally from Hamburg, created red claw | blue cray, as part of a body of work that attempts “to grow a connection with my new home ... a survival mechanism, grounding and connecting me to [Brisbane]”.

His photo-media work has won multiple state and national art awards and his work is held in private, public and corporate collections.

red claw | blue cray was the first photographic acquisition for Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery collection, at 2006 Stanthorpe Art Festival.

Incidentally, the best time of the year to give redclawing a go is when water temperatures reach 28 degrees or above.

acquired: 2006

Playful and expressive, this teapot captures perfectly the feeling of insect frenzy around the lights on summer nights. Hey who ate the green salad, another piece by Dillon in the Stanthorpe Gallery’s collection, warns, ‘Woe betide the vegie patch!’ Leith Dillon’s works are a reflection of her Life’s a Buzz! philosophy.

She studied with Harry Memmott and learnt wheel throwing from Albert Verschuuren.

Leith’s ceramics are found in the QAGOMA collection and have been published in The Journal of Australian Ceramics and in Pottery in Australia.

acquired: 1994

Repeated use of dynamic, curvaceous forms in John Beasley’s wooden sculptures is no surprise. His subjects were mostly biological, plant or plant-like forms, somewhat abstracted. The beauty and danger of summer wildfire was nonetheless characteristic in the contained volume and rising energy of this imposing work, created from a single piece of Jacaranda.

Sculpture was not his primary career: a naturalist based in Kuranda, Beasley produced a number of guides on the plants of Tropical North Queensland in the early 2000s.

He received a Wet Tropics Management Award for his contributions to conservation in the Kuranda region and his years of research into the plants of that location.

acquired: 1998

English born, Sawkins became an Australian citizen and spent the 1970s working and studying art in Sydney and at Northern Rivers CAE.

He began sculpting in wood and ceramics in the 1980s. He won the Sculptural Prize at the Southern Cross Festival in 1993.

This amusing piece depicts the light heartedness of summer, the cool, casual attire, the curiosity of a child and the indifference of the elder. It reminds one of a city and street song:

... Woolloomoolloo, and ‘cross the Domain,
Round the Block, and home again!
Heigh, ho! Tipsy toe,
Give us a kiss and away we go.

- Anon, The Bulletin, 12 March 1898

acquired: 1994

Karla Marchesi gained her Honours in Fine art from the Queensland College of Art, Griffith University, in 2007. Since that time, she has won numerous awards and exhibits widely in Australia as well as in international group exhibitions.

My Bed suggests Karla’s recurrent topic: the relationships between objects, spaces and bodies. Her depictions of these relationships establish subliminal connections to past places, rituals and memories, exploring the realities and anxieties of modern life.

Who is this young woman? What is she doing? It is Karla, herself, reviewing her notes and ideas before sleeping. Nonetheless, the mood is enigmatic and elusive.

acquired: 2010