GREG WOOD
NATURE OF CHANGE
17 - 30.09.21
In his new exhibition, Nature of Change, Australian artist Greg Wood, reflects on the impact of the last 18 months with an innovative approach. Instead of exploring the materiality of the surface, Wood turns to an ephemeral reality - an illusion of the material in the creation of a world that can be glimpsed beyond the two dimensional.
With a technique that embraces a bright and vigorous underpainting, building layers upon layers, Wood finds influences of observation, form, and colour. The result is a collection that uses a fresh methodology, discovering looseness as presented in nature.
The composition of the paintings reveals diluted layers of gestural marks and subtle tonal shifts—the brush marks light on the canvas, soft colours peeking through. They are inspired by Wood’s move to the Australian country; lenient streetscapes with gravel roads, telephone poles, native scrub with hints of a European presence, and reminiscent of the inter-war Australian peri-urban landscapes of Clarice Beckett’s shadowy painterly worlds filled with spirit and light.
In times of isolation, the artist muses on self-reflection, experiencing an emotional void of humanness and, instead, a turn to his surroundings. As such, Nature of Change invites the viewer to look inward to locate place and meaning, discovering connection within themselves.
- Emma-Kate Wilson.
