Australian Artists to Know Now

Australian contemporary art resists a single introduction. Australian artists contend with a landscape and clarity of light that have no real European equivalent. The art is richer in experience as it moves courageously between landscape and abstraction, between cultural inheritance and present observation, between the intimate scale of works on paper and the physical insistence of sculpture.

What follows is a selection: six Australian artists whose practices are worth knowing, and in several cases, worth collecting now.

Greg Wood is one of Australia's most recognised landscape painters, his work accruing a significant exhibition history and award recognition over a long career. His paintings are not documents of place so much as investigations of light and atmosphere, landscapes that accumulate meaning the longer you spend with them.

 Colin Pennock paints with oils, building thick impasto surfaces that sit somewhere between representation and pure abstraction. His landscapes carry weight in the literal sense, his paint applied with conviction and his terrains are rendered with spontaneous emotion.

Dapeng Liu makes work that holds two worlds in careful tension. Born in China and now based in Australia, Dapeng's practice draws on cultural inheritance without being defined by his award-winning paintings finds their own register between traditions and geographies.

Sophia Szilagyi is a Melbourne artist working with traditional printing press techniques as well as archival limited edition works on paper. Her figurative, still life and landscapes hold a powerful emotional and a quiet consistency of her mind’s eye. Sophia’s work rewards close and still attention.

Lindsay Blamey’s abstract Australian landscapes are limited edition works on archival paper and his compositions stir a sense of curiosity. Lindsay’s eye for a detailed landscape composition is acute and atmospheric.

Joel Sorensen carves figures and forms from reclaimed timber, clay, bronze and cement. Working in regional Victoria, his practice moves between the figurative and the abstract, elemental in force and quiet in character.

Taken together, these six artists represents a clear profile of current Australian contemporary art: grounded, compelling and often quietly confident.

Otomys represents established through to emerging Australian and international artists , with work available to view in the gallery at 424 Malvern Road, Prahran. 

Visit us in gallery to view their work or contact us on info@otomys.com