C L I F F O R D H O W

T a k a y n a – T h e E d g e o f t h e W o r l d C L I F F O R D H O W

T a k a y n a – T h e E d g e o f t h e W o r l d

24 July – 7 August 2021

Clifford How’s previous paintings took us on a journey to the Tasmanian Central Highlands. In these new landscapes, ‘Takayna – The Edge of the World’, he takes us on another journey, to the dramatic coastline of ’s north-west Tarkine region.

But ‘journey’ is a word suffering from over-use. It suggests that paintings are like picture postcards which, like some hypnotist’s accessory, can transport us imaginatively off to some other place. Well, actually they do. But perhaps there is a more significant journey involved.

In the 19th Century, photography liberated painting from its evidentiary obligations, so that a portrait or a landscape could be far more interesting than just a document. Not that painting had ever been just documentation, but it could now focus more on triggering an experience than on optical reproduction.

This is true of How’s landscapes which are less about representing the landscape than the experience of being in that landscape. Key to this is how he builds up the surface using a palette knife. Key to this drama is the palette knife. Its directionality, materiality and edginess serve to embody the dramatic tensions portrayed. This process employs what he calls “minimal touches”, creating a kind of abstraction, which the viewer has to ‘read’. The viewer is a participant, constantly responding to the tension Usually the palette knife is part of an expressive technique. In How’s case it is more about between what is being represented and how it is represented. In this way, we don’t so much building up an abstract matrix of marks which he then selectively strips away so that the inner see a reproduction of the landscape, but experience it directly. heart of the painting projects out, creating the illusion of surface highlights, the classic abstract ‘push-pull’ tension between foreground and background – in these new paintings Of course, realism is itself an illusion – first explored by the Barbizon school and the between the verticality of the rocks and the horizontality of the sea, between the surface and Impressionists whose landscapes changed as the light changed. How is also fascinated by what lies beneath, between the energy of the moment and monumental stillness. this mutability – in this case by the mercurial weather of North West Tasmania and how it constantly transforms the landscape. We are invited into this process. There is no sleight of hand: this is a painting, not an illusion. The landscape, which we feel as much as see, is just the occasion of the painting. The previous landscapes had a Corot-like stillness. Despite their inherent drama, nature comes across as a nurturing embrace. Not so these new paintings which depict the wild So, the real journey is in the painting itself as it discovers what it wants to be, not in what it collision of land and sea. Mediated by the volatile weather of the Southern Ocean, the depicts. And the value of any journey lies in the new experiences it offers. Hence, How’s shift fractious sea confronts the timeless resistance of a rocky coast, a drama leavened in location. With the previous landscapes he was, he says, “getting a bit too comfortable”. The occasionally by a protected rock pool or secluded beach. best journeys are always fresh and a little uncomfortable. – Paul McGillick

1. Takayna oil on linen 201 x 216 cm (framed) $22,000 ⬤ 2. Roar oil on linen 201 x 216 cm (framed) $22,000 ⬤

2. Roar (detail) oil on linen 201 x 216 cm (framed) $22,000 ⬤ 3. A Place Where the Ocean Finds Rest oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 4. Roaring Forties oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 4. Roaring Forties (detai) oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 5. Rock Pool – First Light oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 6. Procession oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 7. The Concealed Beach oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 7. The Concealed Beach (detail) oil on linen 170 x 185.5 cm (framed) $18,500 ⬤ 8. Empyrean I oil on linen 139.5 x 170.5 cm (framed) $14,500 ⬤ 9. Empyrean II oil on linen 139.5 x 170.5 cm (framed) $14,500 ⬤ 9. Empyrean II (detail) oil on linen 139.5 x 170.5 cm (framed) $14,500 ⬤ 10. Distant Waves Broke the Silence oil on linen 139.5 x 155 cm (framed) $13,500 ⬤ 11. Littoral II oil on linen 139.5 x 155 cm (framed) $13,500 ⬤ 11. Littoral II (detail) oil on linen 139.5 x 155 cm (framed) $13,500 ⬤ 12. Rhythmic Pulse oil on linen 124 x 155 cm (framed) $12,000 ⬤ 13. Where Few Have Walked oil on linen 84 x 185.5 cm (framed) $11,000 ⬤ 14. Timeless Motion oil on linen 109 x 114 cm (framed) $8,500 ⬤ 15. Coastal Sojourn oil on linen 84 x 89 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 16. I Was Faced Into the Southern Fury oil on linen 83.5 x 89 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 17. Littoral I oil on linen 88.5 x 84 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 18. Empyrean III oil on linen 89 x 84 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 18. Empyrean III (detail) oil on linen 89 x 84 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 19. Cove oil on linen 58 x 124 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 20. Ocean Garden oil on linen 59 x 124 cm (framed) $6,500 ⬤ 21. The Weathered Cove oil on linen 68.5 x 58 cm (framed) $4,800 ⬤ 21. The Weathered Cove (detail) oil on linen 68.5 x 58 cm (framed) $4,800 ⬤ 22. It Was a Brief Moment Between Showers oil on linen 63.5 x 58 cm (framed) $4,700 ⬤ 23. Squall oil on linen 58 x 58 cm (framed) $4,600 ⬤ 24. Surge II oil on linen 53 x 58.5 cm (framed) $4,500 ⬤ 25. Where the Departed Once Walked oil on linen 53 x 58 cm (framed) $4,500 ⬤ C L I F F O R D H O W

Born 1974, Launceston, Tasmania

AWARDS, GRANTS & RESIDENCIES 2014 ‘Ancient Form’, Brave Art Gallery, Longford, TAS 2019 Michael Harding Oils, International Ambassador 2013 ‘Elements’, Mill Providore Art Gallery, Launceston, TAS 2018 Bruny18, Bruny Island Art Prize, TAS, Highly Commended 2012 ‘Elemental’, Artspace Gallery, Deloraine, TAS Hornsby Art Prize, , NSW, Winner 2011 ‘Luminous Reality’, Mill Providore Art Gallery, Launceston, TAS St George Art Awards, Sydney, NSW, Highly Commended 2017 Wrest Point Art Award, , TAS, Winner SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS Calleen Art Prize, Cowra, NSW, Finalist 2021 ‘Coming Home’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW Glover Prize, Evandale, TAS, Finalist ‘Summer Salon’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW 2016 TASART Awards, Burnie, TAS, Winner 2020 ‘Renewal’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW Hornsby Art Prize, Sydney, NSW, Judges Commendation 2019 ‘Reflections of a Fading Sky’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW Paddington Art Prize, Sydney, NSW, Finalist 2018 ‘Paint 18’, Poimena Gallery, Launceston, TAS St George Art Awards, Sydney, NSW, Finalist 2017 ‘Still Life’, Handmark Gallery, Evandale, TAS Glover Prize, Evandale, TAS, Finalist ‘Works on Paper’, Handmark Gallery, Hobart and Evandale, TAS 2015 Launceston Art Society, Tasmanian Art Awards, TAS, Highly Commended 2016 ‘Terra Nova’, Launceston, TAS 2014 Bay of Fires Art Prize, TAS, Finalist 2013 TASART Awards, Burnie, TAS, Finalist SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY Bay of Fires Art Prize, Salon des Refusés, TAS, Finalist Pippa Mott, ‘Clifford How, Great Southern Land’, Artist Profile Iss.51, 2020 Launceston Art Society, Tasmanian Art Awards, TAS, Finalist Amber Creswell Bell, ‘A Painted Landscape, Across from Bush to Coast’, 2012 Launceston Art Society, Meandering 2012, TAS, Best Natural Landscape Thames & Hudson, 2018

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2021 ‘Takayna – The Edge of the World’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW 2020 ‘Antipodean Light’, Arthouse Gallery, Sydney, NSW ‘Province’, Handmark Gallery, Hobart, TAS 2019 ‘Halcyon’, St Cloche Gallery, Sydney, NSW ‘Elysian Fields’, Handmark Gallery, Hobart, TAS 2018 ‘Sojourn – Cradle and Beyond’, Handmark Gallery, Hobart, TAS 2017 ‘Vaporous’, Handmark Gallery, Evandale, TAS 2015 ‘Primal Interiors’, Brave Art Gallery, Longford, TAS 66 McLachlan Avenue Rushcutters Bay NSW 2011 +61 2 9332 1019 [email protected] www.arthousegallery.com.au Photograph by Eddy Delorie