“The act of painting has taken me closer and closer to the natural beauty around me.”
Here are links to find more about me:
youtube - Artlovers Australia online gallery - Facebook - Instagram - Bienarte fine art school - Marcel Desbiens online art school
Looking back now over all those years, I can see a consistency in my art floating between opposite poles as the pure traditional representation and complete abstraction. I was thinking again about the whole thing as people often ask me for a definite label of a style attached to my art. Should I be a realist, surrealist, abstract, expressionist, traditionalist or modernist or even avantgarde?
I can clearly separate my production sporadically in 3 sections:
1- Realistic representation made from photographic reference.
2- Realistic effects recreated from live observation and memory.
3- Surrealist or even abstract imagery created from pure improvisation.
The link I can see between them 3 is as a strong impression of living nature, the presence of the universe immensely macro and micro with an organic feel to it all.
Then I realise my interest is purely compositional and the style or subject, or lack of subject has no importance. Therefore, I can enjoy painting either from life, from a photo, from my imagination and memory and even from nothing at all. The result is consistently a representation of form and colours placed together in harmony for the pleasure of the eyes and the mind.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2018 Lethbridge Gallery, Brisbane
2016 Lasting Impression Gallery, Kenilworth
2011 Lethbridge Gallery, Brisbane
2009 Gallery 2120, Brisbane
2008 Gadfly Gallery, Delkeith, Perth
2007 Delshan Art Gallery, Modern Art, Melbourne
2007 Gadfly Gallery, Delkeith, Perth
2006 Delshan Art Gallery, Modern Art, Melbourne
2005 Maria Perides Gallery, Brisbane
2004 Delshan Art Gallery, Modern Art, Melbourne
2003 Musee Louis Hemon, Peribonka, Quebec, Canada
2000 Galerie la corniche, Chicoutimi, Canada
1997 Delshan Art Gallery, Modern Art, Melbourne
1996 Valerie Cohen Fine Art Gallery, Sydney
1996 Jan Murphy Gallery, Brisbane
1994 “Le moment présent”, Ipswich Regional Gallery
1992 “De la fiction à la réalité”, Travelling exhibition
1992 Centre culturel de Dolbeau, Dolbeau, Canada
1992 Salon du Conseil régional de la culture, Jonquière, Canada
1992 Promenade du Vieux-Québec, Québec, Canada
1985 Caisse Populaire de Sherbrooke-Est, Sherbrooke, Canada
1983 Galerie coopérative des arts visuels, Chicoutimi, Canada
1980 Galerie Menasen, Sherbrooke, Canada
1975 Café de la Cour, Québec, Canada
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 Finalist in The Clayton Utz Art Award, Brisbane
2023 Finalist in The Kenilworth art prize
2023 Finalist in The Lethbridge Landscape Art Prize
2012-2023, 20,000 Lethbridge prize, Brisbane
1996 to 2018 Tattersall’s Club Landscape Prize, Brisbane
2016 to 2023 Brisbane Grammar School Art Show
2015 Sunshine Coast environmental art award
2002-2023 Combined Brisbane Rotary Club Brisbane
2012 Mortimore Prize
2006-07 The Black Snake Art Award, Queensland
2005 Whyalla Art Prize, South Australia
2005 Works for the blues, Brisbane
2005 Reflections of life, Art Prize, Brisbane
2002 Warwick Art Gallery Art Prize
1999 Verlie Just Town Gallery, Brisbane
1999 Western Gallery, Toowoomba
1998 Alice Bale, Art Award, Melbourne
1998 Ex. Cat. Smith & Stoneley Gallery, Brisbane
1998 Redlands Art Awards, Cleveland
1998 The Gold Medal Art Show, Melbourne
1995 “The Sky is the Limit”, The Contemporary Art and Design Gallery, Brisbane
1995 “When Angels Prey”, The Bauhaus Art Gallery, Brisbane
1994 “Drawing Connection”, Metro Arts, Brisbane
1993 “Crossing”, BEMAC – Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
1988 “Living Nature”, Natural Sciences Museum, Ottawa, Canada
1984 Centre international d’art contemporain, Paris, France
AWARDS
2023 First prize The Kenilworth art Prize, Queensland
2007 First prize, Best of show, The Black Snake Art Award, Queensland
2006 Best Landscape, The Black Snake Art Award, Queensland
2004 Commended, Tattersall’s Club Landscape Prize Brisbane
2003 Best Oil or Acrylic, Art Spectacular, Brisbane
1996 First prize, Tattersall’s Club Landscape Prize Brisbane
1994 First prize, Moreton Shire Exposition, Ipswich
1989 Le prix d’excellence, Concours national des arts visuels, “Rencontre parallèle » Montréal, Canada
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE COLLECTIONS
Brisbane Grammar School collection
Domtar Inc., Dolbeau, Québec, Canada
Musée Louis-Hémon, Péribonka, Québec, Canada
Hotel de ville et Centre sportif, Girardville, Canada
Minto Construction Ltée, Ottawa, Canada
First Provincial Building Society, Ipswich, Australia
Caisse Populaire de Sherbrooke-Est, Sherbrooke, Canada
Caisse Populaire de Girardville, Girardville, Canada
Rydges Hotel, Southbank, Brisbane, Australia
Tattersall’s Club, Brisbane, Australia
Ehime Women’s College, Ehime, Japan
Maharaji Center, Amaroo, Queensland, Australia
Robina Hospital, Queensland , Australia
Mural dyptique, Sport Centre Girardville, Canada, 2 sections of 10’ x 20’ each (3m. x 12m.)
Commission in a private house, Hawthorne, Qld, 2.4m. High x 8m. Long
Commission in a private house, Broadbeach Qld, 3.5m. High x 8m. Long
Mural Chermside Library, Concept, design, supervision and final coat in cooperation with a high school art students group, 2.4m x 10m.
Commission for Delshan Gallery’s client, Melbourne, 1.5m x 2.5m
Murale Environment Centre, Jardin Scullion, Lac St Jean, Canada