Len Fox Painting Award Finalist 2024
Castlemaine Art Museum
27 September 2024 - 2 March 2025

"E. Phillips Fox was never afraid of colour. He is reported as saying that ‘He no longer saw anything except as a colour sensation’. He became less burdened with the chores of formal painting and more willing to concentrate on the sensual delight of colour. His brush strokes are confident and free, his love of light, especially the play of dappled light and the effects he could achieve are breathtaking. Often utilizing a technique of mixing colours with white, Fox created an even brightness that gives the illusion of prismatic light. The theme of his paintings revolve around the natural beauty of the everyday, throbbing with life and spirit.

For me colour and light are optimistic markers for the natural environment. Filling my painting with vivid yellows and dappled light, I hope to keep the life of this critically endangered little bird, the Regent Honeyeater, throbbing with life and spirit.

So few of the local population of the Regent Honeyeaters remain, their distinctive mating song is slowly being lost to its fading population. It is devastating to think that this species can become so low in number that they don’t have the adult males nearby to teach the juvenile males their unique ‘love song’ to attract a mate."