Story behind the work: Woman in Midnight Water

‘Woman in Midnight water’. 2021.

Oil on oil paper.

‘Woman in midnight water’ is a stream of consciousness contemporary painting. At this time I was attempting to make as much work as possible within my resources which lead to a lot of works being created on oil paper.

The stream of consciousness element of this image actually came prior to painting when I was doodling in my sketch book and in the sketch I was drawn to the long sweeping shape of her torso. I felt that this was strong stylistically and wanted it to exist as a painting.

In my contemporary paintings like ‘Woman in midnight water’ there is an intersection between creativity in terms of story telling (the characters and narratives in the piece, in this case a water-nymph like figure enveloped in night) and creativity in terms of exploring the principals and elements of design: shape, colour, line etc.

Looking at this piece now I am reminded by one of my favourite paintings that I would visit at the Queensland Art Gallery when I was living in Queensland: ‘Spirit of the Plains’ painted in 1897 by Sydney Long. In both there’s a mythical element that intrigues me.