Chrissie Lloyd – Solitary homestead. Beltana, SA

Artist Statement

Beltana was once a thriving township on the original “Ghan” train line. In the 1940’s, 64 trains passed through Beltana each week. However, once the Sliding Rock copper mine closed the rail line was redirected and the number of people living and working in the town began to rapidly decline. Today only a few intact buildings remain. The landscape is peppered with ruins, only a chimney showing where there was once a home.
The day I visited it was overcast with a storm approaching. The eery light brought out the rich red colour of the soil contrasting against the blue grey of the salt bush and fast moving clouds.
Was the house occupied? I do not know.

About the Artist

For several years in my 20’s I enjoyed oil painting. Then in 1990 I went back to art working in watercolour, mixed media and acrylic.

I studied with Pamela Fairburn, a noted Sydney watercolourist and also with the late Arthur James, an artist of international repute in life drawing. For six years I studied portraiture both in oils and charcoal with renowned portrait artist Yve Close.

I also enjoyed life drawing and sculpture with Alan Somerville for four years. I have attended many workshops and tutorials with well known Australian & New Zealand artists including Bernhardine Mueller (master printmaker) and Patrick Carroll (multi-award winning Australian landscape artist) whose approach in both the physical and spiritual sense has influenced my use of acrylic and the way I “feel and see” the landscape. No matter how widely I travel the Australian landscape has my heart.

I exhibit at Humble House Gallery in Canberra; with the Woodford Bay Group of Artists; at the Royal Easter Show; previously through Judith Salmon of Salmon Galleries in North Sydney; at exhibitions held by Art Societies of which I am a member and other exhibitions in which I am invited to participate including the Hunters Hill Art Exhibition, Waterbrook Greenwich and Waterbrook Yowie Bay. I have been invited to both speak and do demonstrations for Art Societies and for years I was an invited judge for the Eve Vonwiller Youth Art Prize.

Commissioned works currently hang in private collections in Australia, the UK, USA and New Zealand.

Chrissie Lloyd C.V.