Acrylic and mixed media 80cm square on plywood board; contemporary Tasmanian oak frame

AVAILABLE POA – please contact me if you would like to view the work

Blue Planet examines the universal quest for knowledge, and exploration. Underlying themes include the colour blue; water; climate; environment; plastic and escape.

Artist Statement

“I really love painting on the wooden surface so I can sand, scrape, gouge and score straight lines into it.  I tend naturally towards curvilinear shapes and love circles so in the initial stages I used watercolour pencils and stencilled varying sized circles in a repeated grid pattern to kick start ideas.   The effect was a universe with hundreds of tiny planets.   I continued to explore  that theme.

A third of the painting is given over to the colour blue and a collage including:  maritime chart paper; own stencil script and text on rice paper, Japanese fine art paper; knitting patterns; and lace;  forming a paper bridge the gap between this world and the next in an endeavour to communicate with other life forms.

circles planets moons universes energy rocket

The top section has extra fine watercolour pigment applied undiluted in sparkling Duochrome Desert Bronze, Oceanic and Turquoise) enhanced and sealed with glaze.   The work is sealed with Mastisse Satin Varnish.

“How inappropriate to call this planet Earth when it is quite clearly Ocean,” Arthur C. Clarke once astutely commented.

So I made an ocean and a “fantastical” and unreachable universe above it.
Karen Rogers January 2022

triangle pink writing gold

One of the many layers; after sanding collage pieces revealed themselves, the red/orange shape looked like it was lifting off like a rocket leaving earth on a mission.

powerful rocket three blue universe planetary