Jan Murphy Gallery is pleased to present, ‘Petrichor’ the new exhibition from Lara Merrett.
Lara Merrett’s colour-rich abstract paintings reveal an intimate and intuitive approach to painting. Working on a large-scale, Merrett apposes blocks of velvety dark colour with transparent, amorphous pools of acrylic and ink. These delicately layered paintings evoke senses beyond the purely visual, and hint at connections to memory and
place.
“The exhibition title, Petrichor, describes the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. I love this word and even more so learning it was invented in the 1960’s by two Australian scientists. It’s a word that literally comes from an Australian landscape. I’m always trying to make my work cross over to other senses like touch so it’s quite nice to
bring the idea of smell into painting.
In early 2020, I returned home to the South Coast of NSW after a year living overseas. Seeing everything charred black from the 2019 bushfires was shocking but also strangely beautiful. There were bigger skies and the opportunity to see so much new growth. The constant rain meant lots of crazy growth. It’s work that is very much based in my South
Coast post-bushfire landscape.” (Lara Merrett – 2021)
‘Petrichor’ is Lara Merrett’s fifth solo exhibition at Jan Murphy Gallery. In 2018, Merrett was commissioned for the Jackson Bella Room at the MCA Sydney. The immersive installation invited visitors to touch, move and interact with her brightly coloured paintings that were suspended from the ceiling. In 2019, Merrett was commissioned by The University of Queensland Art Museum to produce High Stakes a two-part project beginning with a temporary outdoor studio residency and culminating with a large installation inside the museum. Her work is held in numerous private and public collections, including the University of New South Wales, Artbank, Macquarie Bank, Sofitel Hotel and UBS.
Image credit: Lara Merrett, Forget me, 2021, acrylic and ink on linen, 183.0 x 174.0 cm
