Talking With Painters

It's hard to define what makes a good landscape painting but, if you investigate the backstory, you might find the artist has a close connection with that place. In Belinda Street's October show at Straitjacket Artspace, 'Keep your feet on the ground and your thoughts at lofty heights', her bond with the alpine landscape was obvious, particularly with Mt Kosciuszko in NSW. Her repeated exploration of that mountain has led to exciting reimaginings in paint. A winner of one of Australia's most significant landscape painting prizes, the Paddington Art Prize, Belinda evokes a reverence for this natural environment through expressive mark making and dramatic use of colour. It was this body of work which we talked about in front of an audience as part of the Newcastle Art Gallery Society art program and which I'm bringing to you in this podcast episode. We also touched on Belinda's early career, the representational and the abstract in her work, juggling motherhood and an art practice, as well as many aspects of