“Tropical Abstract”

60 x 40 cms

Luminance coloured pencils on Canson pastel board

Own reference.

Abstract coloured pencil art is, has and won’t ever be flavour of the month  with the vast majority of cp artists. Cp art is highly conservative and dominated by realism. That’s not to say that there are some wonderful examples of ‘traditional’ cp art , there certainly are!

It is often spoken why cp art isn’t ‘in favour’ with mainstream art and some art galleries. Maybe its conservative approach is the reason.

My art has taken a strong left-turn of late that has resulted in a number of drawings that are either semi-abstract or abstract. I love the freedom that abstraction brings. This doesn’t mean (in my work) that is all ‘guess and hope for the best’. All of my work is based on the ‘known’, in this case, interpretations of the Australian photos, either from photos I have taken, or from older drawings that have been re-interpreted.

I completed a smaller study of this drawing several weeks ago and followed up with this larger piece which sat in my studio for several weeks before I was ready to complete it. The subject is a section of a palm tree trunk from Mission Beach in Far North Queensland. I came across the palm tree about 6 years ago as it stood surrounded by thousands (yes, thousands) of fallen coconuts and many smashed trees the result of Cyclone Yasi.

What interested me the most were the various markings on the trunk and 6 years later I have produced a drawing that epitomises what I ‘saw’.

Abstraction has its detractors, but I find not only the process of creating them rewarding but I also enjoy looking at the finished product. Every time I look, I see something different. Shouldn’t all art be that way?

Richard