2 Journeys

These new works are the result of two recent journeys. Both in Western Australia, but both very different. Seemingly worlds apart.

The modes of transport also couldn’t have been more different. One walking the Bibbulmun Track with a backpack and camping, the other cruising the Kimberley Coast on a luxury boat.

The South West

Walking the Bibbulmun Track. Camping by the Franklin, Donnelly, Blackwood and Murray Rivers. From Walpole to Dwellingup, mainly in dense forest and lush undergrowth. This journey was about the privilege of being enveloped by the forest, being a very small visitor, like all the other creatures encountered along the way.

The Kimberley Coast

From the Mitchell Plateau to Broome. Seven days on the luxury cruiser, The Kimberley Quest 2. The antitheses of the intimate South West Forest, this was wide open vistas of tidal waters against huge cliffs displaying millions of years of erosion. Buckled and twisted bands of orange and purple walls reflected in brilliant turquoise water, dissected by wind shifts of ultramarine. Early morning trips up tidal rivers, through gorges and mangroves to climb pristine waterfalls for a swim above the Croc line. Most afternoons were spent painting on the upper rear deck as this stunning landscape just kept rolling by, occasionally interrupted by frolicking whales. Tough job, but someone’s got to do it.

Another 2 journeys began when I entered my studio. One, to document what I had seen in a figurative sense and the other to interpret and distill, on the road to abstraction. So these 2 physical journeys have sent me on another 2 journeys of the mind.

Perhaps I should have called the exhibition 4 journeys, but I’d hate to confuse the issue.

Brendon (October 2008)