5. Home – Residencies from before continue to shape this Home residency of mine

I continue painting paintings from previous residencies in paintings during this Home residency and this week a few of my works from previous residencies arrived at destinations new. 
 
My Bundanon residency work ‘A Rhythm of wombats’ has travelled to Montsalvat for the Nillumbik Prize for Contemporary Art 2021.  Truly delighted to have this work selected for this prize and chuffed that it is with the mix of amazing artworks there.  Thanks to all there and I must say thanks to Anna Glynn who will represent me at the opening.  We’ve been in a shared residency before with Art of Threatened Species.  She’s pretty good at pinking it up and you can check out some of her amazing work on the Mt Kaputar Giant Pink Slug here https://annaglynn.com/ArtOfThreatenedSpecies.html The Nillumbik Prize for Contemporary Art  opens 6 May and runs to 1 July. 
 
With this work on paper out and about, I return to search for the strips of water colour squares that I pre-prepared in 2019.  Finding three left, I start to think about what next will appear on these during this Home residency of mine. 
 
And an older work of mine from another residency – my Centre d’art Marnay Art Centre residency in France 2017 – came out of the studio to hang out closer to home at the new Platform Arts Hub Blayney.  It seemed apt to pick ‘Pigeon Down’ (image here) as one of my works for the ‘At the Station’ exhibition on until 30 May at this railway platform gallery.  I came across this dead pigeon on the first day of that residency.  At the end, it was given a good farewell back by the river by the artists from this shared time .  
 
Revisiting my blog archives from this time in November 2017 brings back memories  … “ My studio at this residency in Camac, Marnay-sur-Seine has been packed up and I have gone (nearly) …  I am sure to carry with me many experiences like the rush of the launch of the pigeons from the tower above, the bells chiming on the hour and half, the slow whoop of the swans as they fly by my window, the amazing food and good wine too, the earie closeness of the nuclear power plant, the what must be 400 year old oaks up the hill, the spiral stairs up three floor climbed daily, the shooters presence, the marks left from centuries gone, the immenseness of my studio and amazing side tower, the journeying with the wonderful group of artists from all corners of the globe and the locals too, who so warmly welcomed us to the fold, but most of all I think thanks to this time, this place and these people, I will take with me the sense that I really have been in the present.“
 
This Home residency program is proudly funded by the NSW Government through Arts Restart via Orana Arts Inc.