Eclectic, The Artist's Eye | David Welch

  • David Welch, Hastings River, Port Macquarie
  • David Welch, Southern Highlands
  • David Welch, Nobby's Head, Port Macquarie
  • David Welch, La Danse
  • David Welch, Rain on the Monaro
  • David Welch, Shoe Fetish
  • David Welch, Day’s End, Bilgola
  • David Welch, My Secret River
  • David Welch, Mysterious Island
  • David Welch, Silent Sentinel
  • David Welch, Strange Cloud Over the Monaro
  • David Welch, Man in Flames
  • David Welch, The Yellow Dirt Road
  • David Welch, The Footsteps of Giants
  • David Welch, We'll Always Have Paris
  • David Welch, The Artist's Dog
  • David Welch, Ruin on the Monaro
  • David Welch, Madonna of the Sands
  • David Welch, Dead Giant on the Monaro
  • David Welch, House by the Highway
  • David Welch, Highway
  • David Welch, Paris, Le Marais
  • David Welch, Sunset on the South Coast
  • David Welch, What Lies Beneath
  • David Welch, A Home Among the Gum Trees
  • David Welch, Bridge on the Monara
  • David Welch, A Big Sky Country
  • David Welch, Bush Monolith
  • David Welch, Road to the High Country
  • David Welch, City of Light
  • David Welch, Self Portrait
  • David Welch, Farm by the Highway
  • David Welch, The Lovers of Le Pont des Beaux Arts

Eclectic, The Artist's Eye
22 September - 10 October 2011

The Macquarie dictionary defines the word eclectic as, ‘derived from many sources’, a word I think fits perfectly my concept for this exhibition. My principal inspiration is landscape, that place where we find meaning and a connection to a sense of place. I’m not particularly interested in virgin bush landscapes, what interests me is the ‘cultivated landscape’, that is the visual traits of our attempts to fashion this land to our utilitarian, sometimes aesthetic notions of what ideal country should look like. Our landscape shows evidence of the many successes but equally it is littered with failures, ruins, abused earth, a testament to our clumsy struggle with forces over which we sometimes have no control. There is also the ‘landscape of the mind’ an altogether much more subtle and complex, shadowy place, inhabited by countless images and sensations looking to find meaning in a complex world. The more I paint, the more I see, and the more I see the more I want to paint, to try and fix that place or that sensation in a concrete image by the timeless technique of oil painting. By selecting an image or concept to paint and isolating a subject in a frame, I am inviting the viewer to consider my perception of that subject, to take a second look. My painting is all about the language of perception. My aim is to trigger an emotional response, an, ‘I know that’ moment. I believe that we all share a very sophisticated collective visual memory bank, and if an image draws a response then it’s doing its job.