Australian Outback

Inspiration from the Outback

In which texture emerges

Under the competing influences of fine art and graphic design, the skills of the fine artist dominate and I move from line-based imagery to the more intricate detail that can be achieved with dots, and eventually with combinations of dots and lines.

I created these landscapes and aerial views of the harsh, dry Australian outback in my mind. The ochre hues of a panorama that writhes under sweltering mirages and threatens to explode into the setting sun before dying into the blue, chill serenity of a starlit night – this is my inspiration. I listen to my husband’s stories of his training in the Australian Army and I feel how I imagine it feels to live within this amazing scenery … a land I hope our children will grow to know and love as much as we do.

In the 'Sand Dunes' series, the influence of Aboriginal Art is clear… an art and tradition I can appreciate while still remaining true to my own identity and style.

ART Portfolio

NELLIE Zimmerman

AUSTRALIAN FLORA

MY INTERPRETATION OF A NATIONAL ICON

I too love a sunburnt country (with due acknowledgement to Dorothea MacKellar) and in this series I didn’t dream of replicating the beauty of our native flora. Instead, I have attempted to create my own symbolic representation of Australian Flora as an abstract artist. The shapes and colours evoke the amazing contradictions of seemingly delicate beauty that can be found in the dry, and sometimes hostile Australian environment, in which fire, death and regeneration are a recurring theme. When I think of Australian native flora I think of beauty on a small scale, the beauty born of endurance, perseverance and a cycle of life that appears to extinguish before miraculously bursting back to life.