Convergence

Q: As graduating artists, how has your time studying at TAFE shaped the work you chose to exhibit at Tree-O Gallery

Holly: Our time at TAFE has given us space to test ideas, challenge ourselves, and uncover artistic practices that feel authentic to us as individuals. The works we have chosen for this exhibition reflect the technical development, and the personal and conceptual journeys that emerged for each of us throughout the course.

Q: The five of you are sharing a space, but you each have your own visual voice. In what ways do your works speak to each other, and where do they deliberately clash or challenge one another?

Holly: The works intersect through shared curiosity and lived experience from our time spent together,moving through a process of creative development together. They challenge each other through contrasting materials, approaches, visual languages, and conceptual themes. By embracing our differences, an interesting tension and dialogue emerges that reflects the diversity within contemporary emerging Artists.

Q: Exhibiting at a gallery is a big step for emerging artists—what has surprised you most about preparing for this show, and how has it changed the way you think about your future?

Liam: Exhibiting at Tree-O gallery is a huge step for us! The most eye-opening aspect of preparing for the exhibition has probably been the amount of organisation involved to put a show like this together. It often goes unseen by gallery visitors just how much has been done in order to put the artwork on show. It has also been amazing to see how supportive and excited local artists and the community are about the show.

Q: If someone walks out of Tree-O Gallery next month remembering just one feeling or idea from your work, what do you hope that is—and why is that important to you at this stage of your life and study?

Liam: We each have our own personal intentions with our art and our practice. Whether it is to tell a story, evoke an emotion, communicate an idea, provide an experience, inspire someone to create, or simply give someone something beautiful to look at, every artist has their own individual aim. But as a group we really just want people to enjoy the exhibition and come away from it having felt and experienced something that has moved them.

What Convergence, The Exhibition Where Tree-O Furniture & Art Gallery, Raleigh When 30 May – 13 June

Images ‘Split’, mixed media on paper, by Liam Peacock & ‘In Flow, Together’ Acrylic on board, by Holly Breach,