John Wolseley: 'Australasian Grebes on the the Witjibar River with Lacustrine Insects'

John Wolseley: 'Australasian Grebes on the the Witjibar River with Lacustrine Insects'  2018-2022.

Etching and watercolour, edition of 15, 58cm x 45cm (unframed).

website: johnwolseley.net

My work over the last 45 years has been a search to discover how we dwell and move within landscape. I have lived and worked all over the continent from the mountains of Tasmania to the floodplains of Arnhem land. I see myself as a hybrid mix of artist and scientist; one who tries to relate the minutiae of the natural world - leaf, feather and beetle wing to the abstract dimensions of the earth's dynamic systems.

Using techniques of watercolour, collage, frottage, nature printing and other methods of direct physical or kinetic contact I am finding ways of collaborating with the actual plants, birds, trees, rocks and earth of a particular place. These prints were made from 2018-22 by after recent experiences working in East Arnhem land with the late Mulkun Wirrpanda, and in the Riverina while making paintings for the project Earth Canvas. The Arnhem land prints include various creatures including Forest Kingfishers, Striated Pardalotes and ants which nest in termite mounds.

The Riverina etchings are about the miccorhizal fungus skeins and webs which connect trees and plants, and the rich aquatic life of the rivers, creeks and chains of ponds on Bibberinga Farm.