STUDIO NEWS 2005/2006 - February 2006
After 10 months in our new Mosman Park location, we are now settled and enjoying our
change of environment. We miss aspects of our beautiful old home but the new space offers
a more compact but efficient working space and we’re enjoying a busier studio with an ever
growing number of visitors finding us here. Leon divides himself between the two locations
and has created a beautiful space in his painting studio in Mt. Lawley.
EXHIBITIONS 2005
2005 was punctuated with travel and exhibitions. Collections of work were on show at
Convent Gallery, Daylesford, VIC, Salmon Gallery, McMahons Pt. Sydney, NSW,
Gunyulgup Gallery, Yallingup WA, Penny’s Hill Winery/Greenhill Galleries Adelaide SA,
Marks & Gardner Gallery, Tamborine QLD, and Customs House Gallery, Warnambool
VIC.
THE MOVE
The dominating and seemingly never ending event of the year was the re-location. It was no
mean feat to pack up a lifetime’s posessions and collected works. The sheer physical energy
spent left us exhausted. After 4 skip bins and a garage sale we regained a semblance of order.
Leon, the bower bird, uncovered innumerable treasures while I, the minimalist, worked on the
motto “if in doubt, throw it out”. Basically an incompatible partnership and although there’s
still evidence of the bruising we’ve survived the worst.
With the marriage of our son Damien to the gorgeous Jasmin from Munich, at our Margaret
River home in March, 06, we delayed the commencement of building Leon’s studios there.
This was part of the rationale of the studio move. It enabled us to create another studio
space for Leon to continue the pursuit of fulfilling his myriad ideas and concepts whilst living
in Margaret River.
NEW STAFF
Kylie Rath, our new printmaker/artisan is a fantastic addition to our studio staff. Not only
does she put up with Helen, Dave and myself but she is patient and attentive to the quirky
and unpredictable requests from Leon. She has shown herself to be very versatile,
contributing to our studio in multiple areas as required. There’s not much Kylie hasn’t
tackled in life having travelled extensively, working in remote parts of Australia, Africa and
the Middle East. She brings youthful exuberance and a fresh opinion to the working studio.
During the late afternoons Jackson Carroll, school tie askew, breezes in and lends a hand to an
assortment of tasks with a confidence and enthusiasm only matched by his sharp wit. His
love of working with wood brought him to us but he enjoys helping in many tasks in the
short time available.
QUATTRO FRAMING
We’re loving our internal courtyard between gallery spaces which provides a perfect setting
for alfresco morning teas and lunches. A great deal of work was done to create the overall
space to suit our needs and little by little the shop front for Quattro took on a life with added
objects of interest in our window displays including glassware, jewellery, interesting print
images and collectables. Our customers have flowed by word of mouth and from passing
traffic spotting our bright graphic image from the street. It’s been very successful and Dave’s
high quality framing has been appreciated by many return customers.
We still need further work to complete an upstairs space which will provide additional gallery
viewing and much needed storage with a kitchen facility as well.
NEW WORKS
ome amazing works of art are coming from the studios as Leon delves deeper into a broad
range of collaged works combining found objects, specially collected objets d’art and the
most unlikely pieces of trash or treasure sourced from heavens knows where!! These works
are stunning and are being snapped up by collectors. The only downside at this point is that
there have been no new print works for at least a year.
It’s almost impossible to predict what mighty materialise during this year but when a new
body of work is assembled, we’ll plan for an exhibition and post the details online. Stay
tuned or write to us and ask to be placed on a mailing list for your region.
In the meantime the new works can be viewed at the Mosman Park studio, Greenhill
Galleries Perth or Gunyulgup Galleries, Yallingup and the many other galleries representing
Leon’s work always have a selection of recent and early prints.
Moira Pericles
february 2006 Newsletter
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