WINNER

Artist Name: ANITA WEST

Artwork Title: BANKSIA RAIN

Medium: acrylic on linen

Size: 183 x 183cm

About the Artist:

I am interested in the idea of romantic notions attached to the Australian bush. I am intoxicated by its earthiness, its subtle hues and chaotic rhythms. I want to breathe in the sublime beauty and bring it to life through my paintings.

Artist Statement:

‘Bush Banksia and the Flood’ began its life as a 3 x 2 m huge canvas inspired by the landscape of Girraween National Park on the Border of QLD and NSW. We were exploring this beautiful part of the world after the devastating fires of 2019 when the landscape was coming back to life. Then the Queensland floods in February of 2022 devastated my downstairs studio and the painting frame was ruined, so I had to pull it all apart, which was emotionally challenging. I then struggled to work on it in my studio, I think the impact of these events threw my creativity into a tailspin. Eventually though, years later, this work has finally emerged and seems to take on the beauty, the optimism, the chaos and the flood that it had lived through and literally absorbed in the studio.

Judge’s Comment:

Anita West’s landscape is immediately captivating in its scale and vibrant palette. Bright gum leaves and banksia melt and converge towards the painting’s central vortex, pulling the viewer into a void of running colour and empty space. Originally a visual response to the 2019 Girraween National Park bushfires, the work was then ruined by the 2022 Brisbane floods that devastated Anita’s studio. Eventually, years later, the painting was salvaged and transformed into the final work before us. With this context, the central abyss becomes a powerful metaphor for both Anita's personal struggles with creativity post-flood, as well as the broader impact these events had on our community and environment. Amidst this turmoil, however, there lies a quiet sense of hope and optimism. The ink washes echo the cleansing of flood debris by water, while blossoming flowers reveal the beauty and assurance of nature’s ability to regenerate. The result is a rich story of environmental and emotional resilience, and is a deserving winner of this year’s Landscape Prize.

Runner Up

Artist Name: JOSEPH J MCGLENNON

Artwork Title: FLOWERING PURSUIT TRIPTYQUE

Medium: Photographic

Size: 150 x 300cm

About the Artist:

"My goal was to capture and freeze in time the Victorian Kangaroo Hunt in the mid-1800s, preserving the grace and power of the kangaroo as it defies its unforgiving colonial pursuers in an uncompromising era. I aimed to evoke the resilience and majesty of the kangaroo amidst the challenges they faced during that historical period."

Artist Statement:

Embark on a visual odyssey with my photographic triptych, capturing the dynamic pursuit of red kangaroo by wild hunting dogs in the breathtaking Flinders Ranges. These images unfold against the backdrop of the rich Australian landscape, where rugged terrain and vibrant flora become a canvas for the primal dance between predator and prey.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Artist Name: BLAIR GARLAND

Artwork Title: THE LANTANA MCHAPPY MEAL

Medium: Wool, cotton, canvas mesh

Size: 25 x 28cm

About the Artist:

Blair Garland is a multidisciplinary artist whose work approaches the domestic suburban experience, often incorporating traditionally female craft methodologies in honour of too-long overlooked narratives.

Artist Statement:

Before McDonalds crossed the seas and infiltrated Australian culture and diets, Lantana was introduced by colonists without care. The plant quickly became a noxious pest, smothering and killing native vegetation. In this unusual coupling of phenomena, The Lantana McHappy Meal confronts the audience with a composite of invasive forces.

Judge’s Comment:

This work locates the landscape within PopArt where Lantana as invasive species is something like rapid multiplication of fast-food outlets. Combining these through craft demonstrates the power of our actions in affecting change through making.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Sponsored by Art of Framing

Artist Name: BENJAMIN HEDSTROM

Artwork Title: ELEVATION I (ALLIE COVE)

Medium: Oil on linen

Size: 150 x 100cm

About the Artist:

Hedstrom’s body of work responds to everyday encounters and memories that serve as a record of somatic grounding and the relationship we form with our surroundings. Hedstrom's work represents fleeting vignettes of contemplation, suggesting a confluence of the ebullience of human connection and melancholic meditations on the fragility of existence.

Artist Statement:

‘Elevation I’ explores textural contrasts of geological forms and flora. Cliffs and rock formations are recurring motifs that reflect on the fleeting nature of life in comparison to the ancient landscape. ‘Elevation I’ represents an allision between the static landscape and the perspective of the viewer.

Judge’s Comment:

A compelling image, with rich textures and impasto's whilst incorporating subtle hues and tones. Strong aesthetics hold all these elements together in a piece that capture the heat and rugged nature of the environment.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Sponsored by Art of Framing

Artist Name: ZAC MOYNIHAN

Artwork Title: SUNSET ON THE GRANITE BELT

Medium: Oil

Size: 10 x 25cm

About the Artist:

Zac Moynihan is a plein air landscape painter working in oil. He is drawn to atmosphere and light, aiming to capture beautiful design and colour in nature.

Artist Statement:

A Winter sunset painted just outside of Stanthorpe, QLD.

Judge’s Comment:

Sunsets are notoriously hard to pull off in painting without becoming sickly in one way or another. This plein air painting succeeds in avoiding all the pitfalls. Close observation from life is clearly evidenced.

Judge’s Comment:

Reminiscent of plein air work of the past, captured quickly and is a solid impression of the landscape under highly transitory conditions.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Sponsored by Art of Framing

Artist Name: PHILLIP ROLTON

Artwork Title: THE SWIMMER

Medium: Watercolour & Ink

Size: 80 x 120cm

About the Artist:

After many years working within the abstract genre, I have recently adapted to PhotoRealism paintings working with watercolours, pen & ink. I am drawn to compositions of natural environment, city built form & ‘on the street’ moments. I utilise high resolution photography and En plein air sketches as the foundation for my art. Having a career as a colour retoucher in the printing trade, furnished me with intricate brush and pen skills whilst studying fine art at the Sydney Art School andMelbourne Gallery School under the tuition of John Brack. Life drawing classes by Jon Molvig in Brisbane, offered me an appreciation for form and interpretation.

Artist Statement:

As I reflected on the serenity of this natural environment during my walk around the edge of a 17,000 year old volcanic crater, I was greeted by a lone swimmer with his defining wake parting the motionless waters of the Lake Barrine landscape. From my wife’s photography, I prepared to paint this unique composition in a photorealism genre using pen, ink and watercolours on Archers Watercolour Paper.

Judge’s Comment:

Painstakingly rendered yet still harmonious in it's flow.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Sponsored by Art of Framing

Artist Name: RUDIGER WASSER

Artwork Title: BOXED IN

Medium: Photograph

Size: 81 x 81cm

About the Artist:

Ballina based photographer Rudiger Wasser holds a Master of Visual Arts from the Queensland College of Arts (QCA), Brisbane. He has exhibited in Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Byron Bay, Murwillumbah, Lismore, and Stanthorpe. Rudiger Wasser works with digital cameras. His main subject areas are architecture, urban, street and landscape.

Artist Statement:

Boxed in – Student life in the city centre of Brisbane. It seems that Ikea and Lego got together, threw in a few bright colours and machine generated affordable city living for young people. Life repeats itself every four floors in slightly different shades. - WE ARE INDIVIDUALS!

Judge’s Comment:

This is a view of the landscape that we don't often see in photography, the formal composition of vertical and horizontal lines, combined with primary colours, and flatness creates a painterly affect associated with modernist painting. This manifestation of early abstraction into urban living creates here a claustrophobic environment.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Artist Name: PENELOPE OATES

Artwork Title: ETCHED THROUGH TIME

Medium: Acrylic, ink and heated soldering iron on timber

Size: 150 x 150cm

About the Artist:

I work pre-dominantly with a heated soldering iron on board with a mixture of acrylics and inks, a technique I have been developing and refining over a number of years. My first love has always been drawing so the etching/burning marks process has become an integral part of my process.

Artist Statement:

The landscape is both the past and the present, its processes reveal and conceal, intrigue and confront us...a never- ending drama. I see myself as more of a mark-maker than a painter, the process of burning overlapping and repeated lines into the painted surface nicely mirrors the processes played out in nature.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Sponsored by Art of Framing

Artist Name: KATE L. BARRY

Artwork Title: LANDSCAPE DIPTYCH, RATTLE AND SLIDE

Medium: Oil on canvas, Framed in oak

Size: 48 x 124cm

About the Artist:

Katherine Barry is an expressionistic abstract painter working in Brisbane, Meanjin. Kate’s work is an intuitive response to sensory internal dialogue. Works evoke nostalgia and a profound connection to nature. Kate has been acknowledged in esteemed awards: Winner Hawkesbury Art Prize 2023, finalist Clayton Utz, Lethbridge Landscape, Milburn Landscape prizes.

Artist Statement:

Intended tumbling and energetic surface manipulation of earthy robust colour and rhythmic strokes and forms seen on dry uneven trails, “Rattle and Slide” is a shifting bush-scape that ignites an intellectual or psychological musing as we allow ourselves to be lead and drawn along the surface.

Judge’s Comment:

Colour and mark are successfully deployed here making one wish to continue exploring where they lead. Much is suggested, intentionally or unintentionally, sometimes the suggestion of a profile or creature or a sense depth and certainly the detritus of the bushland floor. All executed in harmonious colour.

Judge’s Comment:

The expressive nature and energy of this piece conveys the bush in a highly engaging work, which has vitality and spirit of a noon day in a scrubland

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Artist Name: NICK OFFER

Artwork Title: AQUA PARK

Medium: Oil paint and ink on aluminium composite

Size: 97 x 138cm

About the Artist:

I am drawn to painting landscapes mainly as a way of exploring a sense of the animal histories (mainly human) that have shaped and scarred them, using a broad range of approaches and tools (rollers, spray paint, ink, silicon, transferred abstract images, stencils, scrapers etc.) to achieve this.

Artist Statement:

Each time I took my daughter to the Aqua Park I was struck by what a strange imposition it is on the lake, with its garish colours and tubular forms. I painted this image to try and convey this incongruity.

Packer's Prize

Sponsored by Pack & Send Milton

Artist Name: DINO TODOROVIC

Artwork Title: TWIN PEAK MIST

Medium: Oil

Size: 60 x 120cm

About the Artist:

Dino is a self taught artist who began painting in January 2024 after quitting the corporate life. As a full time dad, Dino finds the time to paint here and there as time allows.

Artist Statement:

This piece is to commemorate a trip to Tasmania and a failed attempt to get to the summit of Cradle Mountain due to excessive winds, in contrast to the placid day in this piece.

Best Of Brisbane Award

Sponsored by Ray White Paddington

Artist Name: SACHI OIZUMI

Artwork Title: LIGHTNING CRACK OVER BRISBANE

Medium: organic pigment colour

Size: 80 x 60cm

About the Artist:

Sachi is modern artist classically trained in 100% natural traditional Japanese art techniques. Each paint is mixed by crushed natural mineral combined glue extracted.from deer skin.

Artist Statement:

Lightning Crack Over Brisbane - A repaired crack (Kintsugi) depicting lightning over Brisbane, symbolising resilience and recovery. View from Paddington.