The current vibrant exhibition at the Traffic Jam Galleries Neutral Bay gallery is entitled CONTEMPLATIVE WHIMSY and features works by Andrew Grassi Kelaher and Danielle McManus.
Andrew Grassi Kelaher ‘s delightful works are mostly land/seascapes. They are all fairly similar in style and composition but are enchanting. There is much made of the wonderful sky and clouds and the various changing colours. Grassi Kelaher sometimes uses spray paint for atmospheric effect especially in the skies. Sometimes the reflection in the water is an important part of the work.
There are often many bobbing small boats with colourful sails that lead the eye from the top to the bottom of the page. Rocks and trees with their distinctive textures are also heavily featured .In Harbour’s Edge the boat sails are darting like shark fins. In Weekend Sunshine emphasis is placed on the extra number of houses intruding into the environment. When it Rains it Pours and As the Rain Passes By feature glorious pink-to red- clouds. Cool Calm Cruising has a wonderful solitary Rosella parrot in flight.
Danielle McManus’ works for this exhibition include Scarlet Beauty an intricately detailed portrait of a waratah, undulating with life. Milk and Honey is a striking depiction of a banksia, with curling grey stem, a magpie arrogantly yet glumly perched on top of it.
There are also some of her whimsically charming paintings of assorted people with her trademark use of huge eyes. Melody features a young accordion player in a grey dress with a white collar at night, a bird perched on her shoulder, another on the instrument.
Rapture depicts a young lady in 18th century dress, a bird at her waist, another in her hair. She appears to be listening to an old fashioned record player which has a cornucopia of native flowers, birds and butterflies exploding from it. Wild At Heart shows a young child with a fox ear headdress, looking like she is holding a book or symbolic doors to the heart, with butterflies perched on her shoulders, flowers– especially a large waratah -and birds .
I Wish I Could Fly Like You is a wistful portrait of a lonely young child up a tree wearing old fashioned pilot goggles and surrounded by birds.
A most exciting exhibition. The exhibition runs at the Neutral Bay branch of Traffic Jam Galleries until 10 December 2018.
Featured image- .Danielle McManus-‘Rapture’- 90-x-120cm-acrylic-and-mixed-media-on-canvas.