Willow Gum Blossom is Part Nine of my Field Notes 30 × 30cm Collection.
I have discovered that the willow gums blossom several times a year. The gumnuts in part one are from the same trees. I was delighted to start finding branches with blossom in Peace Park later in the year. The flowers have a beautiful scent. The trees are really tall, but I would find sprigs of blossom on the ground. I don’t know if it was from the wind or the lorikeets who love the nectar. The flowers are small but so vivacious with their myriad stamens and elegant buds.
I only painted the willow gum blossom from life as I shifted my focus onto large-scale panels around this time.
Field Notes is divided into ten parts, each exploring a plant or tree I have encountered in my Brighton, 4017 neighbourhood. I observed the specimens on my daily dog walks, bringing a sample back to the studio to make drawings and paintings from it.
I worked on this collection from January to October 2026, so the paintings also record the changing seasons and the flora of my new neighbourhood as the year unfolded.
Each part consists of five paintings. Two were painted directly from life in natural light in my studio. These are titled Tabletop and Vessel. The other three paintings were developed from my drawings and worked as a triptych, exploring abstraction and the act of looking.
The final two parts of the collection developed a little differently, with two paintings in each. By this point I was ready to move on from the 30 × 30cm format and began working on my first 90 × 90cm paintings. Sometimes a collection tells you when it is time to change direction.
There are 44 paintings in the complete collection, each measuring 30 × 30cm and painted in acrylic on ply. The ply panels are cradled in meranti.
I chose the 30 × 30cm format because it is the size of my sketchbook, so it felt like a natural scale for this project. I also liked the connection to the idea of a foot - these paintings began with looking, walking and noticing what was around me on foot.
Willow Gum Blossom is Part Nine of my Field Notes 30 × 30cm Collection.
I have discovered that the willow gums blossom several times a year. The gumnuts in part one are from the same trees. I was delighted to start finding branches with blossom in Peace Park later in the year. The flowers have a beautiful scent. The trees are really tall, but I would find sprigs of blossom on the ground. I don’t know if it was from the wind or the lorikeets who love the nectar. The flowers are small but so vivacious with their myriad stamens and elegant buds.
I only painted the willow gum blossom from life as I shifted my focus onto large-scale panels around this time.
Field Notes is divided into ten parts, each exploring a plant or tree I have encountered in my Brighton, 4017 neighbourhood. I observed the specimens on my daily dog walks, bringing a sample back to the studio to make drawings and paintings from it.
I worked on this collection from January to October 2026, so the paintings also record the changing seasons and the flora of my new neighbourhood as the year unfolded.
Each part consists of five paintings. Two were painted directly from life in natural light in my studio. These are titled Tabletop and Vessel. The other three paintings were developed from my drawings and worked as a triptych, exploring abstraction and the act of looking.
The final two parts of the collection developed a little differently, with two paintings in each. By this point I was ready to move on from the 30 × 30cm format and began working on my first 90 × 90cm paintings. Sometimes a collection tells you when it is time to change direction.
There are 44 paintings in the complete collection, each measuring 30 × 30cm and painted in acrylic on ply. The ply panels are cradled in meranti.
I chose the 30 × 30cm format because it is the size of my sketchbook, so it felt like a natural scale for this project. I also liked the connection to the idea of a foot - these paintings began with looking, walking and noticing what was around me on foot.
