From 5 July to 3 August 2019
Leading contemporary Australian artist Diana Watson's latest exhibition 'Foscari Chapter' is now on at Gallery One, located at The Brickworks in Southport. The first solo exhibition for Diana at Gallery One opened with 'Drinks with the Artist' on Saturday afternoon 13 July 2019. Gallery clients and visitors were thrilled to meet and congratulate Diana on her new work.
The internationally renowned artist has received critical acclaim for her evocative still life paintings. Watson's art has been part of more than 40 solo and 26 group exhibitions in Australia, Italy and the US. Her work is held in collections all around the world.
"I capture and record the fleeting beauty of everyday life. There is a need to share this beauty in a world that is not without its foreboding. My hope is this imagery provides the viewer with a sense of hope and peacefulness", says Ms Watson.
With over 40 solo exhibitions and her artwork held in collections around the world, Diana has received critical acclaim for her evocative still life paintings. In a genre that is time immemorial, the works presented in 'Foscari Chapter' do not disappoint. Using a minimal palette of delicate colour, Diana has constructed a series of representations beautifully illuminated against dark umber tones and which deliberately pay homage the baroque masters of tenebrism. Diana's full blooms convey a peacefulness and purity as each painting draws you in and around a 'vanitas' of life's simple pleasures, fragility and transience.
A seasoned traveller to Italy since her earlier career days in fashion, Diana recalls experiences in stylish Roman villas entertained in the most superb way by the family matriarch. For Diana these encounters were a sensory heaven of opulent feasts and festive atmosphere and continue to influence her current art practice today. 'Foscari Chapter' exhibition takes its name from the Villa Foscari, a patrician villa in the Veneto region, northern Italy, designed by the Italian architect Andrea Palladio. Like wandering the gardens and rooms of the villa, Diana's paintings are redolent in history and tradition, inspiring a romantic journey of the imagination.
View the exhibition catalogue here: https://gallery-one.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Diana-Watson-excatxf.pdf
