Image-maker Hillary Monckton is newly enrolled in a visual arts program at the University of Sydney. “I feel I am more of an art student than an artist,” she says. “There’s so much reading to do!”
It’s an adjustment Hillary is excited to make. A keen art workshop participant, she is a committed member of groups in Waterloo and Woolloomooloo. She’s also exhibited work – drawings, paintings, photography, print and mixed media – in a number of group shows.
Fellow artists admire Hillary’s commitment to art practice – a willingness to learn different techniques and risk experimentation.
“My work is often more intuitive than intentional,” she says, “and it’s usually spontaneous.”
‘Zebras’, for instance, was the result of finding a discarded canvas at the Ozanam Learning Centre (OLC) and pasting some black-and-white prints (another artist had thrown them into the paper recycling) onto the gessoed canvas.
“I then added pink, green and blue, and some yellow fluoro paint. The process unfolded over several days.
“I consciously chose to paste the zebras in vertical sequence, but the paint was applied with a feeling for balance and harmony.”
While not “consciously symbolic” the zebra stripes are strongly graphic. They also connote camouflage – and evoke associated themes of home/habitat and hiding, even hidden meaning. The figures are wild animals, vibrant, vibrating in a field of colour.
“I found them and liked them, and was able to use them,” Hillary smiles.
_______________
Saturday Art Workshops at South Sydney Uniting Church, second and fourth Saturdays of the month, 12-4pm. Phone 0438 719 470.
OLC Art Programs include painting, drawing, photography, screen-printing, ceramics and more. Phone (02) 9358 8100.
