Artists of Australia
Inspired by the colour and texture of the outdoors -
Inspired by the colour and texture of the outdoors -
It struck me during lockdown how important my garden is to me. Hell yeah - I knew I like to fiddle with new plants and the colour bursts I could create, but its more than that. I like to get my hands dirty for starters - can't stand wearing gloves. Then there is the fact that I love to be barefoot in the garden whenever possible - takes me straight back to childhood when I rarely wore shoes running around the gardens I grew up in. I don't know about you, but back in the 60's it was just fine to do so - not sure my mum even noticed that I rarely wore them. This was in the outskirts of Johannesburg where I grew up. I think it was more of an issue for her when visiting family in the UK she saw me walking down the road in Lowestoft, holding hands with my grandad, with no shoes on (I had told him I never wore them at home!) I digress.
So after spending more than normal at the local Bunnings and getting down and dirty in the garden as much as possible at the start of Lockdown I found from talking to artist friends that many of them were unconditionally drawn to their gardens too. It feels like we are compelled to generate new life colour at this time. I got to thinking about just how many artists over the years have had great gardens. Of course I googled it - tried to find books about it - only to find that really there is only information about some of the most famous whose gardens influenced the evolution of art from the 1860's to the 1920's Claude Monet - known as the Artist-gardener par excellence for his knowledge and creativity in his garden. He designed his gardens specifically to paint in particular Giverny in Normandy which became his principle subject for the last 20 years of his life. Famously he said "I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers" Gustave Caillebotte - stopped exhibiting at 34 to devote his life to gardens and his garden was regularly visited by Monet and Renoir Pierre Bonnard - who was influenced by leading English garden designers like William Robinson and Gertrude Jekyll and he liked the Wild Garden with loose drifts of colour. Max Liebermann - was influenced by the German garden reform movement with series of outdoor green chambers surrounded by hedges. Like Monet he planted sections of his garden specifically to create motifs for his paintings. Now I mention these great artists not because I am planning on meeting and talking to the next potential artists who follow them but rather because it shows how important gardens were both in the past and now I think. SO - this blog will take me to meet, hopefully, a lot of interesting and skilled modern day artists that are also inspired by their gardens. It also gives me a great excuse to go travelling first locally then more widely once we are allowed to in order to uncover artists and their secret gardens. If anyone is interested in how my garden has influenced my current work here is an example - others can be seen at www.kayknights.com
2 Comments
|
Kay KnightsI am an Australian artist who is crazy about her garden and I'm inspired by the colours and contrasts in my backyard. I truly believe that Gardening is Art - I believe that many Artists are similarly inspired in their gardens. This Blog is for me to go and meet some of them and share their gardens and art. ArchivesNo Archives Categories |