How has your understanding of your art medium or themes grown as you have continued in your career?

My career spans multiple disciplines and has always been characterised by versatility in both style and practice. I have been an artist for as long as I can remember — from early childhood through to formal recognition in my school years — but it was during my tertiary studies that my work began to take on conceptual weight.

While at university, my practice was informed by activism, particularly a strong feminist perspective. I painted the female figure within dense architectural environments, exploring power, visibility, and containment. Over time, this approach began to feel limiting. The imagery fractured, and my work shifted away from literal representation toward abstraction.

Being introduced to Goethe’s theory of colour and Rudolf Steiner’s writings on colour marked a turning point. I felt I had finally encountered a language that aligned with my intuitive understanding of art — one that positioned colour as a living, perceptual force rather than a descriptive tool.

My subsequent studies in theatre, Butoh, and Body Weather movement practices were foundational to my current work. These disciplines led me to develop what I now call Body Sense Perception and Response — a methodology grounded in Goethean colour theory, somatic awareness, and the effects of colour on human perception. While my paintings are abstract, this approach allows viewers to engage with the work through sensation rather than representation, offering a deeper and more embodied relationship with abstraction.

Are there any particular moments or experiences that made your artwork mature or change significantly?

During my Bachelor of Fine Arts at La Trobe University, my work focused on social and political concerns, particularly the experiences of women and First Nations peoples. These early paintings were figurative, often large-scale oil works depicting the human form within landscape.

After graduating, my encounter with Steiner education and Goethe’s and Steiner’s theories of art and colour fundamentally altered my understanding of painting. For the first time, art-making felt coherent — not as an intellectual exercise, but as a perceptual and experiential practice.

At the same time, I was working as an actor and began training extensively in movement and spatial awareness. Collaborating with director Suzanne Kersten and studying Butoh exposed me to practices that heightened bodily consciousness and environmental responsiveness. The convergence of these experiences catalysed a decisive shift in my work toward abstraction and colour. Since then, I have felt no desire to return to literal representation; abstraction offers a more truthful and resonant language for my concerns.

Can you share how your art style or methods have changed since you first started?

My current practice is an amalgamation of over three decades of interdisciplinary research. During my undergraduate studies, I explored abstracted representations of the female figure, often positioning her centrally within environments that reflected objectification and constraint. Painting was my primary focus, though performance was already emerging as an important parallel interest.

After completing my degree, I pursued intensive training in theatre and movement, including Body Weather practice under Japanese artist Min Tanaka. This work shifted my attention away from overt political narrative and toward sensory experience, embodiment, and environment. I began to adopt a less didactic approach to art-making, favouring a perceptual and somatic methodology.

Further study in colour theory and application in Switzerland reinvigorated my painting practice, offering a way to translate performance-based research onto the canvas. Painting became a site where movement, perception, and colour could be given permanence. The intertwining of these disciplines continues to shape both how I create work and how I invite audiences to engage with it.