Interview bania Bloodwood

Interview bania Bloodwood

Up close with artist Madeline King – ABC Wide Bay Qld – Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Up close with artist Madeline King – ABC Wide Bay Qld – Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

Bania Bloodwood opens Feb 3!

Exhibition Invite

If you find yourself travelling through Childers QLD between the 31st of Jan and the 18th of March, be sure to drop into the regional gallery to check out my new work. The gallery will be bursting at the seams, full of a years worth of my painting. It also features my most recent works inspired by the patterns in coastal forest floors. Expressive, colourful and uplifting, it’s free to see, and worth the visit.

Gidji Art

Culture, art helps to get jobs

Nicole Everett | 26th July 2011

Gidji Art shop manager Jane Smith is excited about mentoring work experience students as part of the Shop66 Project.

Max Fleet

JOBSEEKERS and art lovers alike are set to benefit from an exciting new shopping experience opening soon in Hinkler Central called Gidji Art, with one special gallery painting to be donated to Tony Blair.

Gidji Art provides customers with opportunities to buy quality works of art and indigenous artefacts or to simply view the art in a modern gallery allowing local artists to showcase their talents.

Sarina Russo Global Initiative manager Gordon King said Gidji Art is the shop window of an 18-month indigenous retail program called Shop66 which includes training, work experience and mentoring support to “get that job”.

“We expect over 80 indigenous students to graduate from this program,” he said.

“It’s so very exciting to know that Shop66 supports outcomes for the local indigenous community and the region’s artists.

“It is also an important addition to Bundaberg’s cultural tourism experience.”

Shop66 is a $532,000 initiative of the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, Mirvac, Gidarjil Development Corporation and Sarina Russo Global Initiative.

Gidarjil managing director Kerry Blackman said indigenous students gain real hands-on experience in the Gidji Art shop as well as a Certificate II in Retail before they enter the wider retail industry.

“The mix of art and cultural experience, combined with industry excursions and exposure to successful artists and indigenous elders is life- changing for the students and has already created top-quality retail employees,” he said.

“We’re encouraging the local community and industry to support the Gidji Art Shop to help close the gap.”

Mount Perry artist Madeline Zoe King said although she is a non-indigenous artist, she felt “honoured” to have her artwork displayed at Gidji Art.

“I paint contemporary Australian art and I’m really inspired by the land,” Ms King said.

“I grew up on a remote property and I feel very connected to the land.

“As a young Australian I’d love to learn more about the uses of flora and fauna and the spiritual connection that Aborigines have to this beautiful country.”

Development officer for Gidarjil Development Corporation Nadene Jones said another prominent local artist displaying at the gallery was Sid Domic.

“Sid is an extremely talented artist who last year designed the jerseys for the Indigenous All Stars,” she said.

“It’s fantastic to have such quality works of art. Why would you choose a fake impression when you could have an original?”

Mount Perry State School Exhibition

An exhibition by my students at the Mount Perry Primary School.

So proud…it features a giant snake painting…5 m long! If you saw it in the bush it would blind you….so colourful.

Imagination Ignites – ABC Open Blog

PHOTO CREDIT: ABC OPEN WIDE BAY

For an artist, your first solo exhibition can be both exciting and terrifying. To hang work you created in a space for others to interpret can almost feel like allowing a gang of strangers to poke around in your bedroom.

Artist Madeline King recently went through the process and has shared some of her thoughts, photos and findings with us all.

What’s your story Madeline?

When I paint I think of tree bark. The silky diamonds in a grey gum. The jagged ovals in an iron bark. The warm flakes of pink and orange in a spotted gum.

When others experience my work they see contour maps, naked women swimming, cities, diamonds, birds of paradise, coral, stingrays, oceans, and rivers.

Within my paintings live worlds I did not know existed. They come alive when people activate their imaginations.

My first solo exhibition ‘Iron Bark River Oak’, has been about stepping out of myself for a time to experience what others see. This in turn has fueled my own imagination, sparking fresh vision.

I’m not saying that my new work will be about dragons or birds of paradise. But in the process of letting my own vision go for a time, to see the way others dream, opened me up to envision larger scale work, different rhythms within my compositions, and using a new pallet to depict the same native trees.

I am looking forward to seeing how these fresh images in my mind unfold onto the canvas in the weeks to come.

Above right: A brave boy with cerebral palsy wearing 3D glasses. He saw dragons and rivers in my painting Pink Spotted Gum.

Above Center: My former high school art teacher Chris Johnstone. He opened the show and is photographed with me in front of Blue Gum II.

Above Left:
A picture of the opening night.

Opening of Iron Bark River Oak