Gardens: Fragments of Life and Loss: Series of 4 paintings – acrylic on paper

These paintings are from the exhibition and publication, Gardens: Fragments of Life and Loss – an artistic enquiry that systematically explores themes of memory, impermanence, and transformation through the motif of the garden. Drawing upon visual language and observational practices, the body of work investigates how natural environments serve as metaphors for human experience, particularly in relation to loss and regeneration. The paintings communicate knowledge by documenting and interpreting the cyclical processes of change and adaptation in nature, offering insights into how landscapes reflect emotional and cultural memory. This body of work contributes to interdisciplinary dialogues between art, ecology, and the human condition through a methodical engagement with site, material, and temporality.

Acrylic on paper, 22cm x 88cm
Trees Connecting, Summer of Smoke, Hillston
Hydrangeas, Spaces Connecting, Hillston
Stepping Forward and Back, Split Views Connecting
Shanghai Garden, One View Flipped and Repeating

Trees Connecting, Summer of Smoke, Hillston, an eight-panelled painting, is part of a larger series that seeks to capture the shifting views we encounter as we move through a garden—moments of connection, perspective, and change. As the title Trees Connecting suggests, the work focuses on the visual and symbolic links formed by trees within the landscape, acting as bridges between spaces, ideas, and experiences. The creation and cultivation of a garden—its growth, care, and ongoing transformation—shares many parallels with the process of painting. Both require patience, attention, and an understanding of time as something lived and layered. This connection is further echoed in William Cowper’s notion that gardening offers an organic perspective on the passage of time, a sentiment that deeply informs the spirit of this work. These ideas are embedded in the making of the piece itself, where each panel captures a different moment in the garden’s evolving life, forming a cohesive whole through repetition, variation, and quiet reflection.

Hydrangeas, Spaces Connecting, Hillston is an eight-panel en plein air painting that focuses on the compositional interplay of foreground spaces and how these elements can serve to invite the viewer into the scene. This work shifts emphasis toward the solid, more graphic forms of shrubs, trees, and hedges—rendered with a weight and presence that contrasts with the more linear, airy treatment found in the previous piece. The intention here was to explore how gardeners consciously compose space through the deliberate planting and shaping of foliage, and how these choices influence our movement through and perception of the landscape. Each panel captures a fragment of this constructed environment, emphasising how vegetation not only defines boundaries but also punctuates space, guiding the eye and evoking a sensory response to the garden’s structure and rhythm.

The title Stepping Forward and Back, Split Views Connecting reflects the central aim of this work: to explore how the interplay of light and shadow, open space, and the intricate layering of plant forms can be used to guide the viewer’s eye—either drawing elements forward to capture attention or allowing them to recede and contribute to a more atmospheric, emotive reading. Across the composition, there is a deliberate yet subtle use of a positive–negative visual switch in each adjacent panel, creating a rhythm of contrasts that invites both movement and pause. This formal device also reinforces the thematic idea of visual and spatial connection across seemingly fragmented views. While much of the piece was painted from life, capturing immediate responses to light and form, the final composition is shaped by a process of creative interpretation and refinement—where observational studies are transformed through compositional adjustments to express a deeper emotional and sensory experience of the garden space.

Part of the title of this work, One View Flipped and Repeating, alludes to both the process and the artistic intention behind the painting. The work is based on a garden I visited in the centre of Shanghai, where I captured a single photograph. Using Photoshop, I manipulated the image by flipping, repeating, and rescaling it to create an extended, transformed composition. This digital intervention allowed me to move beyond straightforward representation, reimagining the garden as a wholly new visual experience. The result is both a constructed landscape and a layered memory—an abstracted reflection of my time in that place, shaped by personal experience, technology, and artistic interpretation.