Lucy Culliton

All have become subjects of drawings and paintings as the artist looks to the world around her for inspiration, be it time passing in the seasonal variations of her garden, or the cactus forests of the American South-West Culliton visited in 2004. In the exhibition’s Self cactus-hugging 2005, the artist embraces the smooth trunk of a mature saguaro, an act which neatly illustrates her affection for her subjects, and offers an insight into how to read her finished work. ’There’s nothing deep about it,’ she cautions. ‘It’s a love for the thing rather than anything more than that.’ Indeed, Culliton likens her work to a diary kept by someone who doesn’t write. There are always new subjects to consider: new animals, new furniture, new flowers in the garden. ‘I get more excited about the idea for the next painting than the finished one,’ she says. ‘I can’t wait to finish a painting because then I get to start a new one and get the next idea out.’ She describes her process (modestly) as ‘look and put’. In other words, she paints what she sees, working quickly, drawing directly onto the canvas with oil paint thinned out with turps. ‘I think in my head. I don’t do a sketch plan. I do a mental plan.’ For Self with friends 2016, ‘I just imagined my flock of sheep, my cow, and me. Then I put that together mentally.’ The depiction of the artist in a favourite shirt lends the gathering significance and the painting shares its title with her 2006 Portia Geach Memorial Award-winning self-portrait with artist friend Mclean Edwards and former gallerist, the late Ray Hughes. That both close friends and flock are given equal billing speaks volumes for Culliton’s lack of pretension and straightforward approach to art and life. ‘This is as creative as I get,’ she says of the pair of Australian game birds framed against a spectacular sky in His and hers sunset 2003. The painting features two birds she met at the Royal Easter Show and then painted into the landscape of her former home in Hartley. Culliton admits she likes you to smile when you see her work and it’s hard not to when you first come eye to eye with these two. American artist Richard Diebenkorn, an early influence on Culliton, once said that, ‘For a painter, there is nothing better than that his works are really looked at – and seen.’ Winner of the 2000 Mosman Art Prize and a regular finalist in the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes, Culliton’s works have attracted a loyal and large following of admirers, who look upon her work with the same love the artist brings to her all subjects. ‘The local farmers probably think I’m a bit funny,’ she admits. ‘My shearer always asks, “And what’s this one’s name?” But all my animals are kept well and fenced well, so I think they respect me for that. The animals are here for life.’ That bodes well for future paintings, for new ideas and new opportunities for the rest of us to smile. John Saxby John Saxby is the editor of LOOK the Art Gallery Society of New South Wales members magazine. 11 Lucy Culliton: Caution wet paint