Jan Murphy Gallery is pleased to present ‘Soft Skeletons’, Laura Patterson’s second solo exhibition with the gallery.
Continuing Laura’s dedication to ferns as a painterly muse, ‘Soft Skeletons’, presents a body of work enamoured with the dichotomy of strength and delicacy. Created in her home studio after field trips and research, the paintings communicate the grandeur of the overarching forms and feelings of a place while also allowing careful interrogation of details and subtleties.
In painting the likeness of the ancient rainforest landscapes Laura draws from; composed of rich contrasting layering, interwoven with moving light – mark making is encouraged to become equally diverse. Gestural, primary brushwork gradually directs refinement and nuance as each layer of paint builds upon and takes cues from the last. The directness of underlying forms and compositions are still apparent at the paintings surface and sit in harmony with the intricacies that have been developed upon them. The handmade, charred timber frames, continue the ideas of the painted surface, and touch on the ecological devastation that prompted Laura’s earliest fern paintings and hint at the ever increasing threat these landscapes face.
Laura Patterson has a Bachelor of Architectural Design and a Masters of Architecture from University of Queensland. Since graduating in 2014, Laura has worked across both the fields of visual art and architecture simultaneously, until mid 2018 when she committed to working full time on her art practice. Since 2010 Laura has held numerous solo and group exhibitions and she has been a finalist in The Glover Prize, Mosman Art Prize, Hawkesbury Art Prize and was the Winner of the Milburn Art Prize in 2019. In 2021 her work was included in the exhibition ‘City of the sun’ at Museum of Brisbane.
Image: Laura Patterson, ‘The fern head’, 2022, oil on board with timber frame, 57.0 x 52.0 cm
