Collectors Gallery | Kobie Bosch, Mary Donnelly, Nat Ward

The dawn of Australian Modernism was spearheaded by innovations that used the still life to cleave away from tradition. Just look at the way Kobie Bosch slices her scene in half and concentrates on a tightly graphic treatment of the table evoking the cool eye of 1920s Australian painting or the detail of a rich woodblock by the Japanese masters.  Drawing inspiration from the beauty found in our everyday households, gardens and parks, Kobie Bosch’s practice evokes the printmaking masters of the contemporary world. Paying particular attention to design, colour, pattern and line, Bosch’s works are rich in composition. Wishing to translate a bold narrative of Australia native fauna and flora, Bosch’s pieces are a joyful and exuberate response to her surroundings. Born and raised in South Africa, but based in Sydney Australia for a decade and a half, Bosch’s work shows a fascination with Australia’s wildlife whilst also evoking the rich detail of Japanese woodblock masters.

Mary Donnelly is an artist where the smooth tabletop absorbs her entire composition, a poetic minimal space where vessels assume a sculptural and singular grace. Donnelly’s practice is an ongoing study of exploring the underlying compositional structures that lead to an inner dialogue within the work. Highly sculptural still life compositions showcase the understated beauty of simple objects; a collection of objects that would otherwise have gone unnoticed become the subject for observation. Following a trip overseas, Donnelly’s work began to exude hotter palettes of barbie pink and fluoro orange with their complimentary colours falling in line - soft mint greens and turquoise, lime and mauve. She felt the need to embrace and experience the warm colours she enjoyed whilst overseas. Longing to simplify and dilute her work to a core existence is what drives Donnelly. She wishes to create something that is pleasing to the eye; to engage the viewer and create an inner sense of order, a balance in the visual experience.   A finalist in the National Still Life Award in 2017, Mary Donnelly’s artwork offers her viewers an alternative perspective, a harmonious outlet to immerse in and escape.

Unexpected myriads sprout in the dancing leaves and branches of Nat Ward’s wetlands paintings. Their rich surfaces reference “mosaics, textiles, hieroglyphics even Asian script.” Based in Albury, Ward says her paintings are ‘an intimate conversation between herself and the places she walks’ yet they are, obviously, more sophisticated and inventive than that. Using flattened space, folkloric detail, linear depth and a whimsical energized palette, her compositions take the landscape in every direction: up, down and across. Here on one unified plane is the root bed, winding river, mountain top and hidden foliage. Perhaps influenced by the primeval landscapes of New Zealand where she gained her BA in painting, Ward’s work has evolved into a style all her own, paying homage to a pocket of the landscape that is overlooked in favour of more heroic vistas, recently won Waverley art prize in July 2019. "My paintings are based on the interesting and often secret narrative of regional Australia's inland waterways. My intent is for the viewer to firstly see a deconstructed landscape as a cohesive whole then to be drawn in closer to notice the nuanced layers, signatures and details. I am drawn to the mosaics of colour, the whimsical scribbles of nature’s marks and the lacy reflections on the water. Without focusing on the literal and descriptive, the work subtly suggests and translates the story of the dynamic, evolving wetland environment.”