Jude is a Sydney based painter whose abstract work uses a powerful masculine energy to re-interpret atmospheric weather conditions. Her cloudscapes refer to the current uncertainty surrounding climate change.
Jude graduated from the College of Fine Arts in Sydney with a degree and followed up with a Masters in Fine Arts in early 2000. She grew up in a regional area of NSW where her early experiences of weather extremes and climatic drama left her with strong impressions of atmospheric turbulence. Her work presents a type of abstracted weather map depicting forces that are beyond human control.
A range of mediums are mixed with the oil paint to give contrasts in texture. Some areas are scraped back and juxtaposed with other thick gestural marks. The paintwork is deliberately weathered and fragmented in places to reinforce the destructive effect of overwhelming energies. Small shards of bright colour and pastel shapes help balance and add hope to a turbulent and overwhelming scenario.
As a child, living in regional Australia, dust storms, bush fires, floods, drought and lack of rain dominated life on the farm. Survival depended on anticipating and interpreting these occurrences by examining cloud shapes in the sky. These early childhood sensory experiences have been re-interpreted in colour shape and form. The power of natural energies combined with current environmental and political concerns, inform the structure, qualities and mood of this work.
My work draws inspiration from early childhood sensory experiences of weather extremes and climatic drama. I employ a raw emotional masculine energy to paint a type of abstracted cloudscape that has a strong sense of disturbance. There is an uneasiness to the work that suggest that things are not as they should be. The paintings draw attention to a possible new order, one where uneasiness is the norm, and less certainty prevails. Bright colour and soft pastel tones offset the heavy black and white shapes so that tension is balanced by a renewal of energies, a re-arrangement in the unstoppable forces of the earth that may or may not work out well.
41 Military Rd, Neutral Bay, Sydney NSW Australia 2089
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Sun – Mon open by appointment
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