G’day viewers, my names Graeme Stevenson and I’d like to invite you to come on a journey
of creativity and learning and adventure through the series Colour in your Life.
There’s an artist in every family throughout the world. Lots of time there’s an artist deep down inside all of us as well.
So grab your kids, your brothers, your sisters, your aunties, uncles, mums and dads,
and come and see how some of the best artists in Australia do what they do
(Music Plays)
Well welcome back viewers. As you can see Mealie’s really made some quite extraordinary progress on the painting.
She’s swapped to a much smaller brush and obviously putting in some really fine lines now.
Yep
How many of those would you put in? There’s quite a few of them isn’t there?
There is, it just really keeps going. And I like to join everything up as well. It’s kind of like the veins of mother nature.
It’s like a giant membrane.
Yeah
It really is really cool.
Everything’s connected.
And this here, I mean where does the idea of this actually come from?
Just kind of like a sea mollusk or a sea anemone. I really just like to bring in lots of different elements of nature.
Cause that’s really part of a lot of the collecting you do as well isn’t it? With the shells and the skulls and everything else.
You can really see that coming into your work right about now.
Yep, Which is quite extraordinary.
I like to go wandering and take photos.
Yeah. As I said, it really seems to be one of those paintings that just simply has a life force of it’s own
and you’re just sort of guiding the brush to a place that makes it come alive a little bit. But…
really looking quite amazing. So how long do you think you’ve probably got left on that now?
Aw, probably another day or so? Ok
Really, just sort of working at it.
What other techniques are you going to use? I mean, I’ve noticed that you sort of paint fairly flat.
A lot of artists using pasto’s and things like that, but you just enjoy the flat surface.
I really love the texture of the canvas itself.
Are you going to use any other… I can see that you’ve got some blues in there as well,
but that black line seems to be pretty predominant in a lot of these type of pictures for you. And the more you look at it,
with the spirals and things, it looks like it’s a collectable of a whole bunch of things.
It’s a bit like your life. Sort of like bringing all that stuff together like a wandering gypsy.
I do have… when I was growing up we moved around a lot with mum and dad I guess.
We lived in caravan parks all over the country. And I’ve just always collected things.
So I am a bit of a gypsy if you put it that way. [laughs] Yeah… and I guess all of the things
that I paint are all about the collection of things all connecting.
Yeah, and it’s obvious, you can see that. It’s really amazing.
So, you officially haven’t opened the gallery, but you said you wanted to open on the 11th of the 11th, 2011?
I do, That’s a pretty cool date
It’s a great number.
How are you going, progressing towards that?
Getting there. I just have a few things to do with the actual building, just getting benches and things ready,
Well hopefully, the Colour In Your Life series is going to help of course.
Yeah, that’d be great.
We’re going Australia wide with it so lots of people are going to see what you’re doing.
And the Gallery is in the little town of Murwillumbah.
It’s a great little town.
Yeah, you’re actually one of the closer artists that we’ve actually done. Great little town, beautiful area,
it really is quite an extraordinary area. And your gallery takes pride of place in this town as well.
I think you’re probably one of the only galleries that’s available here now as well.
Apart from, you know, the mainstream.
The big one.
The big one, and the Caldera one, which has just opened too.
Sure. But it’s exciting stuff and some great things happening for you. It’s really great.
Thanks.
I just keep working with different areas, and building it up. You know, some areas will be quite bare,
but others will be more layered.
Do you ever put any of the thick, or thicker, paint on? Because it’s a real washed effect, it looks great. Yep
But some artists, they’ve got… like Ben Quilty (I hope Ben doesn’t mind me using his name) but Ben… the paint’s so thick.
I think he must go through about 58 tubes of paint just to do one painting. But that’s not something that interests you at all?
I have done paintings like that. But you know, lots of different work at the moment.
I’m just seem to be attracted to this style of work.
Is there much more or are you going to sort of continue this idea into this area here as well?
I will
And I mean, if you spray that once again; if you add some water on say this area here,
does it do that again? Or will it break that away again? Is there a drying time for it?
Yeah, I mean, it pretty much dries straight away unless I use the retarder, but I can rework.
If you put a bit of water on it… .
It does take a little… Oh but it is coming up…
Yeah… It’s great… Wonderful
So, what we’re going to do Mealie, is we’re going to leave you to finish this off. You’ll from what I can see,
looking at the other pictures around the room, you’re probably going to use some type of varnish over this to finish off?
Which really does bring the colours up doesn’t it?
Yep, it does. It re-lives everything. Makes it more vibrant. Usually just a matte.
I don’t usually use a lot of gloss varnishes, too much shine, but just something to protect it.
Wonderful. And you have your show coming up on the 11th of the 11th of the 11th. Which is um… hard to say.
A night to remember
Absolutely. And if we can get there we absolutely will, but I’d really like to thank you for having us here.
Thank you
It’s been wonderful. You’re an incredibly talented woman. Thank you.
And I hope all the viewers out there will obviously understand as we’ve gone through.
And if you want to see more of these amazing artists; and as I’ve said, remember this is really about education,
it’s about getting into the minds of these people and finding out how they do what they do, and I think it’s extraordinary.
I learn something new every time I do this. And if you want to see more of the artist or even enquire
about the paintings or anything about any of the people you see on this series, you can come to colourinyourlife.com.au
and we’ll forward the messages on or you can talk to us and we’ll take it from there.
But as I say, remember, make sure you put some colour in your life! See you next time.