Just when I was supposed to be focusing on writing a middle grade novel, I embarked on a new project, encouraged by an artist friend. We were about to exhibit our recent work, along with another artist, at Waverley Park Homestead, a beautiful old home in Willunga, South Australia, which is run by the National Trust. The requirement for exhibitions at Waverley Park is for the art to depict local landscapes, with or without historic buildings. I have featured trees in many of my prints, but I suddenly got the urge to paint some of the local trees. There are some splendid old specimens in Willunga, especially on the golf course next to Waverley Park (which used to be the homestead’s land). I discovered that Willunga has a Significant Tree Trail, as do the wineries of McLaren Vale, the region that Willunga is situated in. So I began a series of tree portraits, working for the first time with watercolour on plywood.
My project has mushroomed to a lifelong commitment to painting trees. I cannot now pass one gum tree in five without photographing it from every angle, with a view to painting it one day. I am fired not only by my own fascination with the bark, the twisting limbs and the hollows that have taken hundreds of years to form; I am also inspired by the way people have reacted to my work, telling me that they can SMELL the tree, and imagine themselves sitting up in its canopy, hearing the birds and feeling the breeze blowing through its leaves. I have drawn many other tree species: beeches and oaks in England, pines and spruces in Canada, and paperbarks and Moreton Bay figs here in Australia, but the River Red gums are my favourites. Nevertheless, every tree is to be valued for its role in removing harmful greenhouse gases, providing homes for thousands of animals and trillions of essential microbes, and giving shade and mental and spiritual comfort to countless humans during its long life.
I have just found out that my painting The Guardian, of a River Red gum that can be found at Wirra Wirra Vineyards, McLaren Vale, was longlisted for the inaugural Banksia Art Prize – one of 200 selected from 1,500 submissions. I am pleased and proud that the judges saw something in this work that they valued and admired. I owe this tree a huge debt of gratitude.
At this time, our Premier is coolly proposing to sacrifice another four hundred trees that grow in the Adelaide Parklands for the construction of a Moto GP circuit, having already wrested permission from Adelaide Council to cut down five hundred and eighty five trees to make way for a golf course in the north western corner of the Parklands. I feel more compelled than ever before to stand up for trees in the best way I can – by painting their portraits.
