Our latest Artist Profile is with artist Kim Passalaqua, whose exhibition Landmarks is currently presented at Brunswick Street Gallery.
Kim Passalaqua is an artist who has immersed herself in the topography of Australia’s landscapes in recent years and as our climate has hardened, Kim’s inclination has become more abstract. The natural processes of erosion and weather create a canvas, which is always changing. The colours, shapes, patterns and tones become the visual cues to create landscapes from these ancient surfaces. Kim draws inspiration from the beauty of local landscapes and also the harsh beauty of the raw Australian outback.
“I love to paint many different subjects but it is the landscape which is drawing me to the canvas at the moment. When I say, canvas, I really mean many media and mediums as I am not content to paint using just one medium so I often move between acrylic or oil on canvas, to watercolour, gouache or mixed media.
Can you elaborate a little more on your making process — how does your artwork get from initial concept to exhibition stage?
For the past 2 years, the banks of the Murray River has been my studio, a place where I can feel and touch the ancient ground that has formed the river courses. The concept of my latest exhibition is to mimic the rise and fall of the river. A powerful entity that ebbs and flows and sculpts the landscape. Sometimes forcefully, sometimes peacefully. I want the audience to connect with this force, the feeling of the river. When painting on the river banks I immerse myself in the river ecosystem so the finished canvas lives in that environment too. By the river, I slow things down, to observe and capture this ephemeral beauty in our environment.
Who or what are the biggest influences to your work?
I often channel John Wolseley and consider his expedition to the desert leaving paper in the sands to absorb the surrounding environment. Central to my artistic practice is “the desire to go into the wilderness and enter into a collaborative experience of the environment.” 1 This quote always rings true to me. I like my canvas to have ‘lived’ the experience also. 1 John Wolseley Land Marks III
How does where you grew up, or where you live now affect your art?
For my entire life, I have tightly embraced the bends of the river. I grew up near the banks of the Darling River, in Broken Hill, and now years later, find myself beside the nurturing force of the Murray River. Growing up in Western NSW gave me a love for the vast horizons of the outback that I frequently go back to paint. Now, living in regional NSW, I have access to some of the most beautiful landscapes right on my doorstep. Surrounded by mountains, rivers and native bush provides endless inspiration.
Can you tell us a little more about your creative working environment/studio?
Although I have a studio at my home I also spend a lot of time painting outdoors. This ‘en plein air’ painting and drawing has become an important part of my practice in which I like to slow things down, to observe and search for the minutest parts of beauty in my environment. This immersion into the landscape creates a sense of discovery.
My latest body of work was painted along the Murray River. For months this was my studio, and to hear the river flowing by, the cockatoos calling in the treetops, and to be part of the landscape is an empowering journey. We live in intricate tapestries of landscape so I would like my paintings to enrich and highlight the passages of time and place, and in this way kindle a relationship with the artist and the audience.
As an experimental visual artist, I like to play with the movement of the river, the movement of the paint on the canvas and let both flow downstream. Just as a river has contours, erosion, submerged tree roots, overhanging cliffs, mounds and troughs, I find these forms in my art. By tracing the flow lines along the river, my painting becomes its own ecosystem, its own geographic environment.
What’s next for you after your time at Brunswick Street Gallery? What upcoming projects are you working on now?
I hope to be spending a lot of time travelling and painting in the outback once Covid restrictions have been lifted. The textures and colours of the Australian landscape are the catalyst for my artwork and as I have been working around my local landscapes and rivers for the past couple of years I think it is time to reconnect with the beauty of the Australian outback.
Landmarks by Kim Passalaqua is current until 7 July 2020.