Pic 1: Anthony Joy Rose garden 2013 synthetic polymer paint and white charcoal on paper 102cm x 79cm
Pic 2: Anthony Joy Just a thought 2012 synthetic polymer paint on paper 104cm x 90cm
BANORA Point artist Anthony Joy has collaborated on his latest paintings to bring a voice to people in the community who aren’t always heard.
Anthony’s new exhibition – Kelly Speaking – opens tomorrow 7 June and will be on display at the Tweed River Art Gallery until Sunday 4 August next year.
“Kelly Speaking is about giving a voice to people in the community who often go unheard, ” Anthony said.
The paintings in this exhibition incorporate words written by Kelly, a person close to Anthony with a diagnosis of Down syndrome and moderate intellectual disability. His painting is primarily concerned with interpretation and explores Kelly’s childlike intellect, which with 43 years of life experience, is curiously pragmatic. In relation to visual art, the fascinating part about this intellectual difference is Kelly’s unique way of processing and interpreting visual information.
“As an artist, I have an internal struggle between flatness and dimension, what’s real and natural as opposed to what’s simply contrived. I can’t always indulge artistic freedoms without imposing some sort of order, particularly if the subject is complex or I want to communicate something to the viewer,” Anthony said.
“Scale, focus and colour can only been seen from a ‘true’ or ‘normal’ perspective if you have learned, or have access to, the appropriate visual language. However, from Kelly’s perspective, none of my concerns about appropriate visual language are particularly relevant, as even with her good vision, the visual information she perceives ranges from a blurry close-up to an abyss at a distance of a couple of metres.
“Issues relating to dawn and dusk, where her recognition of unfamiliar forms and shapes take longer to process, change the significance of light. Since living with Kelly, my understanding of vision has broadened beyond that of just sight to include familiarity, time and intellect.”
Anthony Joy was born in Melbourne, Victoria, in 1956 where he studied fine art, design and visual art at Caulfield and Preston Institutes of Technology, over a period of three years. After this time he continued to learn new skills in welding and commercial spray painting and subsequently worked in the engineering, automotive and fabrication industries.
He moved to the Northern Rivers in 1984 and in 2010 changes to his family circumstances allowed him to pick up his art career again. Over the past three years, he has become increasingly interested in figurative art, especially life drawing, which he practises on a weekly basis.
In the context of visual art, the origin of these paintings begins with hundreds of hours of life drawing, which not only provides the image of a figure, but also a frame of mind which seeks spontaneity and freedom of movement in a rapid time frame.
While the works in this exhibition are more considered because of the complexity of the subject and the addition of the text and other elements, they nevertheless were developed from life drawing. With this is mind, Tony would like to particularly thank the tutor of Life Drawing classes held at the Gallery, Shirley Kennedy, for her support and encouragement of local artists.
All are warmly invited to attend the official opening of Kelly Speaking by Judith Terkelsen OAM on Friday 7 June at 6pm (for 6.30pm).
