The Spirit of Nature - Glass Mosaic 2015

During the 2015 European study tour to Italy, Spain and Germany I was most inspired by the quiet places where I could sit take a breath and reflect on the history and the natural beauty surrounding me.

Throughout my travels colours and patterns of nature were themes of the artist I related to the most. The first night I venture out for a stroll and experience the twilight blue moon lingering light at 9.00pm. This was utterly unlike anything I have ever experience previously.

The experience of traveling through Europe has changed my life world views and inspired me to continue to broaden my horizon further in the future.

There were many aspects of the tour that inspired the concept to this new work titled The Spirit of Nature. During the tour I was most influenced by the quiet places where I could sit take a breath and reflect on the history and the natural beauty surrounding me.

Antonia Gaudi’s architecture especially The Casa Batllo building inspired me with the natural forms and shapes. Gaudi used beautifully designed mosaic and lead light glass to cover the hard surfaces that formed into natural shapes of animals including a fish and a dragon.

The exhibition of ‘Monet the Birth of Impressionism’ was an influence on my creative work with his representation of nature through broken brush stokes, colour, reflective light movement to capture the essence and atmosphere in his landscapes and tranquil scenes. Something I learnt from this trip is that seeing original works of art is much more powerful and meaningful then viewing on a screen.

Emily Kame Kngwarrey (1910-1996) was an indigenous Australian Contemporary artist who responded to her land of birth with very large paintings. Earth’s Creation (1994) was exhibited at the Venice Biennale and I was overwhelmed by the spiritual effect of the formation of symbols and colour choices and the enormous size of the piece.

The experience of traveling through Europe has changed my life world views and inspired me to continue to broaden my horizon further in the future.