The following paintings are all linked in the sense that they represent places as they WERE and the people that inhabited them with one exception. The larger painting of the explorer Count Paul Strzelecki is associated with a comment about his ability (or inability) to navigate the wilderness that WAS South Gippsland in 1840. The Strzelecki expedition was only saved by the bush instincts of Charlie Tarra who fed the expedition on ‘monkey bear’ (Koala) and in places as they forced their way across the present Strzelecki Ranges the timber was so thick they could only make progress by felling trees in the direction they thought they should be going (viz. Western Port Bay). The following Stretched Canvas shows the main members of the expedition – Riley and Tarra.
This painting was the precursor to a large 2 panel Mural that was to be finished for the Sesquicentenary (150 years) in 1990. For a number of reasons it remains unfinished.
In other works, the area depicted is of old Outtrim a mining township that in 1901 boasted a population in excess of 4000 people. It is situated between Korumburra and Wonthaggi in South Gippsland in the heart of Black Coal Country. In 2001 the population was 29!
Two other paintings from the smaller series below viz.‘Goods & Swindley’ and ‘The Mercury Office’ were purchased by the late Indian P.M. Indira Ghandi (Chogm 1982)
Sometime in early 1983 after this series had become commercially successful I was sarcastically described as the “Pro of the South’ obviously in reference to Kevin ‘Pro Hart’. I took it as a compliment at the time and about 4 years later I did meet him, but in Melbourne. Fate, for some reason, intervened and a long standing invitation to Broken Hill never eventuated – even though on 3 occasions I was within a 2 to 3 hours drive. In 2005 his health deteriorated and early in the new year he passed away. There’s a message in that!