Raymond Arnold | Elsewhere World, West Coast Prints and Paintings

Please join us at the Watershed for the opening of;

Raymond Arnold – ELSEWHERE WOLRD, West Coast Prints and Paintings.

Over a decade in the making, Raymond Arnold’s panoramic etchings vividly depict Tasmania’s environmental evolution, particularly the West Coast. A dual-Glover Prize winner and celebrated Australian artists, Arnold’s works are showcased globally, from the Imperial War Museum in London to the National Gallery in Australia.

‘The mined and engineered wild landscapes of the Tasmanian West Coast, with their scars and their splendour, are deeply emotional places. None more so than Queenstown. With binocular vision we see both the destruction and the ever-present life force, and we are drawn like moths to the flame.’ – Jill Davis, Landscape as Depth: A Reflection on Painting and Queenstown – Raymond Arnold Catalogue 2022 /Elsewhere World – To see the bones and tombstone at once

Arnold’s Elsewhere World panorama (10 panel etching) has been developed over a decade and has ‘shape-shifted’ from a small ‘en plein air’ etching fragment of a rocky landscape to a large panoramic swathe of sooty black and glacial whites. From depiction of random/erratic forms to a symbolic flow of environmental churn! Weather, fire, mining impacts and climate change impacting country and leaving it’s bones i.e. the rock and the tree stumps exposed as textural elements within a graphic ossuary.

‘For many years I researched the intaglio print medium in Europe. I originally went to Paris and the Atelier Lacourilaut, in particular, to connect to the tradition of making etchings. My great-grandfather’s experiences of the First World War as a soldier in the AIF, Commonwealth War Grave sites, and body armour are concepts that have been played out in tandem with my investigation into the print and identification with a type of ‘figure’ as much as ground!

In Queenstown I established LARQ or Landscape Art Research Queenstown in 2005 with my partner Helena Demczuk. LARQ was a small art centre involving both a gallery and a print studio which was set up to encourage artists to visit Western Tasmania and for them to contribute to its environmental repair and community development. LARQ closed in 2015 after its ten year ‘shelf life’ expired. We are now contributing to a community based art workshop titled PressWEST which we helped to set up in the aftermath of COVID.’

Please kindly RSVP below for the opening night.

Exhibition Dates: 1 October – 31 Oct

Tuesday – Thursday, 10.00am – 4.00pm.

Entry to the exhibition is free & open to the public