Artistic Excellence 2019 | Honorable Mention: Kathy Ellem

Australia

Kathy Ellem, Edges, oil, 24 x 36.

Kathy Ellem, Edges, oil, 24 x 36.

AUSTRALIAN artist Kathy Ellem is no stranger to painting horses, so the subject of her winning entry, EDGES, isn’t surprising. But Ellem took a totally fresh approach in her portrayal of the horse and his rider, right down to the splashes of electric blue, purple, and yellow in the abstracted background.

The artist’s idea for the painting came to her while attending a parade in North East Victoria, “when I saw this bloke casually walking his horse around,” she says. “I knew immediately what I wanted to do, which was to play with edges—to lose some and enhance others.” Working from a photograph she manipulated in Corel Paintshop Pro, Ellem strived to emphasize the attitude of the man and his horse through her lively edgework. “Every painting I do is an attempt at learning something new, pushing my own boundaries,” she says. “This painting particularly stretched my comfort zone.”

Ellem has taken workshops with painters like Scott Burdick, Susan Lyon, and Mark Boedges, but her most important training has come from “brush mileage,” she says. The artist, who grew up on her family’s apple orchard in North East Victoria, married a cattleman, and the couple lived on cattle properties in the Queensland outback for 20 years. Today they reside on farmland not far from her childhood hometown. Ellem, for whom rural life is an ongoing inspiration in her work, hopes to explore the use of draft animals in the years ahead. “I find the people involved in preserving the old ways extremely interesting, and their animals noble and beautiful,” she says. Find the artist’s work at Kathy Ellem Fine Art, Beechworth, Victoria, Australia; and The Old Church Gallery, Moore, Queensland, Australia. —Kim Agricola

This story was featured in the December 2019/January 2020 issue of Southwest Art magazine. Get the Southwest Art December 2019/January 2020 print issue or digital download now–then subscribe to Southwest Art and never miss another story.

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