Respite from the Dry Heat. Artwork

I started out in young adulthood hoping to be an Art Teacher, but was sadly, discouraged from this path. I did however fall back on the idea of becoming an Artist instead as this seemed a very attractive proposition. To that end I focused on Arts subjects in final years at Secondary School, and progressed to completing an Arts and Graphic Design grounded Tertiary Orientation Program at Caulfield Institute of Technology. After a Gap Year spent in Mackay in north QLD, I undertook the first year of an Art and Ceramics Design degree at Chisholm Institute of Technology (later Chisholm University), but at the end of that year, I sort and secured a place in the first year program at the Victorian College of the Arts - Sculpture School (affiliated with the Victorian Arts Gallery but later Melbourne University), and settled there for two years producing a substantial portfolio of work. I realized however, that my ambition in this field was let down by my emotional temperament, and so it was that I dropped out of that degree at the end of the second year, then floundered about for some years trying to find my way in life. I was employed in many fields, while continuing my art, working in Gauche and Pen and Ink and Acrylics . Eventually, I tried to reinvent myself by studying Chinese Medicine and Shiatsu Therapy. In 1988 I exhibited at the Friends of the Earth gallery Space in Fitzroy. Then parenthood came along and the struggling Artist come Shiatsu therapist gave way to the struggling parent. Finally as the famous quote says: "art for art sake, but money for gods sake" became an important motivator and so even though I already had a way of earning a wage, I needed a living wage. I undertook a Bachelor of Science and eventually a Diploma of education to become a teacher, not of Arts but of Science and Math. Approximately 10 years ago while teaching Science, I began to reacquaint myself with my artistic interests and so began a sort of reawakening in which I worked in Oils and Coloured pencil and even early Digital media to produce work mostly related to my interest in the Australian Landscape. Leaving the education hamster wheel in 2019, I worked at an ever increasing pace on artistic pursuits. That brings me up to the current period in this biography.