Women of the Forest

2018 - 2020

 

 

James Whitington statement about the work:

 

In 1990 I was invited to exhibit paintings in a solo exhibition at the Blaxland Gallery in Sydney. The exhibition was entitled “The Tree”.

 

The biomorphic focus to my work has continued to the present day, either as non-figuration or figuration. My current works “Women of the Forest” gather ancient mythology embodied in an Australian forest landscape, the ancient myths of Cybele (The Phrygian Anatolian goddess of Nature handed down to the Greeks as Rhea and Demeter) are expressed by me as a contemporised Australian fable.

 

Trees are often referred to as a motif for the representation of a human lineage. The lineage here is carried from Europe to Australia. The trees in my works are eucalypts and the limbs of the figures and the trees are often juxtaposed and aligned.

 

My figures inhabit the forest environment as guardians, as performers in celebration of the natural environment and sometimes as victims of intrusion. Behind the work is a biocentric view that supports limits on the exercise of human freedom as regards the natural environment and establishes a sense of harmony with nature.