THIS MUST BE THE PLACE
07:06:20
Ash Holmes’ artworks take shape as form shifters, growing and moving with emotion across the canvas, using tones to sensory effect. Her new collection, THIS MUST BE THE PLACE, inspired by Talking Heads’ 1983 song ‘This Must Be The Place,’ balances a transient nature with a time of reflection.
Hints of realism accompany the artist’s distinct abstract, mark-making and soft colour palette; a cup, vase, or wine bottle, suspended on the canvas. These everyday objects reveal the artist’s surroundings, as she reflects on the world in lockdown and self-isolation. However, a deep sense of gratitude washes throughout the canvas, as the artist considers her time to be still and focus on creativity to produce.
Painting has allowed Holmes to imagine exploration, and she channels this into her artworks. The artist works across the canvas in gestural strokes, in an all-over approach. Textural paint is densely applied on the canvas in parts, in others, lightly touched.
As such, the works become about joy, inviting the audience to trigger their own memories and happy places. Holmes furthers this, naming each artwork after whimsical landscapes and places, like Lucent Point, Into Kerela, Lavender Field, Ashes In The Wind, Gold Valleyand Sands Of Time.
In her new collection, Holmes has explored new, grounding, materials: transparent linen canvases, calico material, sand and charcoal. All framed in natural Tasmanian Oak. Her connection reaches out from her studio and to the earth, as the artist reminds her viewers, home is where you want to be.
- Emma-Kate Wilson
Ashleigh Holmes – Biography (2020)
Ashleigh Holmes is a fourth-generation artist based in the Northern Beaches of Sydney, Australia. She has been painting for as long as her hands could hold a brush. Holmes has developed her painting practice from a vocational pursuit into a full-fledged professional career.
An abstract, expressionistic painter, Holmes’ work is redolent of north America’s mid-century colour field painters. In contrast to the severe and obsessive formalism that defined that period, however, Holmes’ compositions are gentle, dreamy and inviting – speaking to the laissez-fairecultural climate of northern Sydney’s beach-bound suburbs. Light-hearted yet graceful, Holmes’ paintings express a visual poetics of the feminine – composed with characteristically soft palettes of predominantly neutral tones.
A recent finalist in the Mosman Art Prize (2019) Holmes has featured in several solo exhibitions including BATEAUat Smithmade Balgowlah (2018) and among them two sell-out shows: CLOUDSat Studio Four (2019) and IMMERSE(2020)Sydney Road Gallery. In late 2019, Holmes exhibited in Malaga, Spain – birthplace of Pablo Picasso. There she discovered on the sun-soaked shores of the Mediterranean a responsive audience and international appreciation for her painting practice.
Holmes’ work exists in private collections in Australia, New Zealand, North America, Singapore, Dubai and Spain. Currently studying The Psychology of Colour and Symbolism to further the relationship her works have with colour and it’s effects.
CONTACT FORM
Thank you for viewing ‘THIS MUST BE THE PLACE’ online.
To open discussions about the current collection, studio visits and commission pieces please reach out.
email : hello@ashleighholmescom
or fill out the form below.
Credits
Words : Emma Kate
Photography : Cassie Hatton / Visual Valley and Ashleigh Holmes
Framing : Sam Holmes / Third Grain
Design :Ashleigh Holmes
Copyright : © 2020 Ashleigh Holmes, all right reserved.
Acrylic and oil pastel on canvas framed in Tasmanian Oak
Dimensions : 126cm x 126cm