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Terry Webber opened his first solo exhibition of paintings on Sunday, September 13 at Woodbyne Gallery, Garden and Guesthouse.
For those who have not seen his award winning work in the numerous local and regional exhibitions around the Shoalhaven and beyond, Terry is undeniably a figurative landscape painter who concentrates on his local environment for the source of his images. His technique is deceptively simple from the painting from photographs from which he paints to the visible brush marks that coalesce into a familiar Australian image.
However, Webber has gone beyond this simple reading of his work in this exhibition which represents his latest work hitherto unavailable to public view. He may use photography as an efficient tool to eliminate the need for sketching for hours out of doors (en plein air), but the result translated into paint demonstrates he is no slave to the colours and other formal suggestions of the photographic image. In other words, the painting does not imitate or attempt to simply replace the function of a photograph.
The only similarity to his finished work and the photograph used to record the original view is the word immediacy. Immediacy in the instant required to make a photograph and the instant required for Terry Webber to decide where he will place his brush stroke, what shape that brushstroke will make, and how that brushstroke will contribute to the unity his audience will recognise as a finished painting. Photography is left behind well and truly. What Webber produces is a feast of wet on wet paintings that have the spontaneity of the out-of-doors painter with the paint qualities of the best abstract artist. The existing and growing confidence that creates these compositions of visual alphabet of painted marks in an enormous variety of natural shapes give to the recognisable image a luscious dimension.
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What Webber produces is a feast of wet on wet paintings that have the spontaneity of the out-of-doors painter with the paint qualities of the best abstract artist.
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Terry Webber does intend to represent the landscape in a recognisable form as he always has. The difference with the current work is the evidence of evolution his continued progress is revealing to all those who have seen his previous work. This evolution could be called an emergence of a individual style or signature method of applying paint to the landscape image.
Webber's technique is already reliably resident in his talent tool box to allow him to produce work on demand. There are no washes of paint, no cautious layering and glazing which he believes "flattens the image. Turps has not robbed the paint of its factory-standard as-new beauty where the pigment is suspended in just the right amount of binder to provide the best colour. Webber does not dribble the ball before shooting, but makes a decision and applies it first time. The directness of application may owe its acceptance in the community to the Impressionists via the Heidelberg school, but Webber is simply reading the landscape as did Vincent Van Gogh. Direct contact with the local environment, not the high ideals of academia, was what made Van Gogh valuable and is what gives Terry Webber's imagery legitimacy beyond that legitimacy of his painting sales. Both Van Gogh paintings and Terry Webber's work must be viewed in the flesh, to be actually seen.
A painting automatically shows that it has been made by a person, but this is accidental and does not show anything significant about the individual Art worker. The choice of subject matter, and the techniques, style and method the artist has chosen to represent the image show decisions not given away by just placing paint on a surface. Choices from the tool box of experience about what style to use, the best technique to apply, what method to achieve communication, give the impression of decision making and therefore intelligence. The intellect of the worker behind the work is what allows an image to become a work of art. The value of art as a representation of the intelligence of an entire community that allowed the artist to develop is one of the hidden reasons Art is so special throughout the world. It has been well recognised throughout the history of art that the representation of one's own time which includes one's own environment is of great importance. One's own environment is quite a broad term.
Equally, photography has liberated the painter from the old chains of classical painting (simply put) and allowed choice between literally representing the landscape or creating something entirely new in the world. The confident marks that not only give depth in the painted landscape, but create that depth amongst the overlapping shapes that are the brush marks themselves. In this sense Terry Webber has created a series of small abstract paintings that combine to make a large realist painting. His collection of images combine with his technique to represent a visual exploration of the artist's local environment. Landscape, while being THE strongest tradition in Australian art, is so often dismissed as not serious art. Terry Webber is not in this category since he is not just painting landscapes, he is a very decent Australian guy who has made paintings about his homeland.
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he is a very decent Australian guy who has made paintings about his homeland.
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The question of whether one enjoys a result in painting that is realistic and representational, or whether one revels in the conceptual symbolism of media in itself is not a pressing concern in the presence of some skilful technical execution in paint. While it may be unusual to mention prices in an art review, this show has some bargains. This is helped by the fact that Terry and Cheryl Webber run a framing business in Nowra called Arts Desire who do very good work.
Terry Webber's images are available for viewing by telephoning Annette and Jeff Moore at Woodbyne Guesthouse, Gardens and Art Gallery on +61 (0)244 486 200 and asking for the gallery to be opened. This is simply due to the variability of visitor numbers and the need to protect the artists work, and a quick call is no trouble at all.
Woodbyne also has a web site at <http://www.woodbyne.com.au> and an email address at <info@woodbyne.com.au> which is handy if planning a trip to Woodbyne and the Shoalhaven in advance. Terry Webber is showing some more work at the annual Kiama Art Exhibition between October 1-8, and he will have some work in the annual Shoalhaven Art Exhibition in Nowra October 22-November 1.
So get out and see. |
