Regional towns and their footy ovals.

Fringe Lyf explores regional towns doing it tough.

“Some other Australian artists have previously looked at this such as Drysdale and Dobell. In Dobell's Wangi Scene (1949) we are presented with a mature mother, a young child and milking cow kept primarily for the family to drink milk. We see the cow is literally kept in the semi urban backyard. It's a blowy day, a bit spartan and dreary in fact. It takes a particular artistic perspective to see the beauty in these scenes. Of course, they're more beautiful on gallery walls so it’s easy to see the beauty at that point. But to paint them in real life, when it's cold and windy is a different thing. The artist who seeks these dreary scenes can easily second guess themselves and their subject matter.

But to me, there’s something about hand-cut hardwood weatherboard cottages, telecom cables, old fences that create sanctuaries for prickly pear, weeds and graffiti. The odd milking goat, flock of cockies and of course the footy are prevalent subject matter in this body of work spanning several regional towns.

The footy oval is ubiquitous in these towns. it’s a shrine. This show catches the oval without the figurative form. In it’s dormant moments. Emptiness is expressed. Whilst none have figures as yet, it seems strange to capture human impact without the figure included. In this way, there’s a post-apocalyptic undertone in the works as the trees meet the urbana. But it is cantilevered by larrikinism throughout the body of work."